Arts and Letter(head)s, Part V

Continuing our look at Packer letterhead through the years comes this exemplar from 1935.

This letter was sent from Curly Lambeau to a young player about to graduate from the University of Michigan:

Dear Ford:

     While on the Coast you told me you were undecided in regard to playing professional football.

     We plan on signing a center for the coming season and will pay you $110.00 per game if you wish to join the "Packers". Our league schedule is not drafted but we usually play fourteen games. We pay in full after each contest and all players are paid whether they play or not and, naturally, all injured players are paid immediately after the game.

     Will appreciate an early reply.

     With kindest personal regards, I am

Sincerely,

E. L. Curly Lambeau
GREEN BAY FOOTBALL CORPORATION

Not much to say in the way of æsthetics on this letterhead; it is nothing like the colorful styles we would see in the 1940s. It is simple and elegant, though, and I like the quotation marks around "Packers" (twice!).

If short on style, this letter is very revelealing in its content. $110.00 per game, whether a man plays or not, injured or not, and even months after the conclusion of a season the following year's contests were not yet set.

Unfortunately, Curly's offer wasn't quite enough to entice this young man to Green Bay. Gerald Ford decided instead to go to law school, then private practice and eventually (following a stint in the Navy during WWII) politics.