"C" Ya!

The game yesterday was a classic NFC North clash, two old-school teams in cold weather. The frigid conditions were great optics but hard on the equipment.

Halfway through the second quarter, linebacker Joe Thomas clashed helmets with Ka'Deem Carey, knocking the "C" decal right off his helmet. You can see it here (until the NFL has the footage pulled):


The Packers had their own share of decal problems. Linebacker Jake Ryan's helmet was similarly battered during the game:

After the game, Ryan tweeted out this picture:

When you play in -10°... pic.twitter.com/ILQJH7dp1h

— Jake Ryan (@JakeRyan_47) December 18, 2016

Ouch. Here's a closer look:

Let's try to forget the helmet-on-helmet contact that created all these marks and focus on the helmets themselves. The paint and decals were made so brittle that they crumbled and snapped. Very striking.

Not All "G"s Are Created Equal

We've talked before about John Gordon, the St. Norbert art professor who in 1961 designed the Packers' "G" logo. Yesterday the Green Bay Press-Gazette had a little more information on his story.

Today's take: St. Norbert art prof lays claim to famed Packers 'G'

by Paul Srubas

Local artist and art teacher John Gordon was killing time in a bookstore a few years ago when he found himself idling through a book on the history of the Green Bay Packers.

John Gordon

He came upon an old photograph of the team’s Lombardi-era equipment manager, Gerald “Dad” Braisher, tinkering with a helmet. The photo caption explained how Braisher was responsible for creating the famed Packers “G” logo emblazoned on the sides of the team’s helmets since 1961.

“I looked at it, and I said, ‘I designed that,’” the 73-year-old Gordon told me last week.

The Packers, as you may have heard, have developed some mystique in their 90-some year history. They’re kind of like a boulder rolling down a mountainside, picking up debris and snow and getting bigger and bigger along the way, until pretty soon you have a million people attending one little Ice Bowl.

But in this case, even though Gordon can’t prove it, his claim smacks of legitimacy.

The Packers G, along with maybe the Nike swoosh, might be among the most recognized logos in sports history, but it’s not like Gordon is standing in front of the Mona Lisa and saying, “You know, a lot of people think Leonardo did this, but in fact …”

In the end, it’s just a squashed G inside an oval. Gordon, an adjunct professor of art at St. Norbert College and a man who counts Cezanne and Velazquez as major artistic influences, is a serious enough painter that an NFL logo would hardly serve as a needed feather in his helmet.

“My 15 minutes, wasted on an oval,” Gordon says with a smile.

But still, the record needs to be set straight.

As an art student at St. Norbert in the early 1960s, Gordon worked part time for Braisher. It wasn’t his artistic aspirations that got him the job; he spent a lot of his time rolling up jock straps, T-shirts and towels and putting them in the players’ lockers each day. Ars gratia artis.

But as a sideline, Gordon also painted portraits of the players and their families and even did a nice one of Braisher himself, which can be seen in a photograph now in the Neville Museum’s collection.

Braisher came to him one morning and assigned an artistic task: Draw a team logo, to go on the sides of the helmets.

Gordon doesn’t know if it was Braisher’s idea, or if it came directly from on high. He suspects the latter, because “Lombardi was a micro-manager,” Gordon says.

In those days, helmets — in college and the pros — didn’t have logos.

“It was remarkable that the idea itself came to be,” Gordon says.

Brimming with youthful enthusiasm, Gordon instantly wanted to embark on a creative brainstorming session, but Braisher cut him off at the knees: The logo shalt be a football shape, with a football-shaped G inside.

“I said, ‘C’mon, Dad, that’s boring,’” Gordon recalls.

No dice. Football shape. Football-shaped G inside. End of discussion.

Gordon set to it. He agonized. He worried about having the great and powerful Lombardi scrutinize his work. It’s also a lot harder than you think to free-hand draw a nice little tapered football-shaped G inside the matching taper of a football.

The next morning, he turned in his work.

Touchdown. Braisher and Lombardi gave it their blessing.

>

Gordon also remembers getting the finished silk-screen decals back from the printer, and working with Braisher to stick them on the helmets.

After that, Gordon put the whole episode out of his mind. It was no big deal, just another task that Braisher had assigned him. It wasn’t until 50 years later, that Gordon saw the photograph in the Packers history book attributing the design to Braisher that it dawned on him: “I designed that.”

Gordon has contacted historians at the Packers Hall of Fame to tell his story, and while no one has dismissed it out of hand, the Packers’ official web site continues to credit Braisher with creating the original design.

Elsewhere, some are beginning to acknowledge that Gordon at least helped.

Wikipedia admittedly isn’t the last word on the topic but relates the story as Gordon tells it: “Lombardi asked Packers equipment manager Gerald ‘Dad’ Braisher to design a logo for the team's helmets. Braisher then had his assistant, St. Norbert College art student John Gordon, come up with potential designs. After Braisher and Gordon were satisfied with the design, a football-shaped letter ‘G’, they presented it to Lombardi who then approved it.”

Epilogue: The logos you’ll see on the helmets during the game today are not as Gordon says he designed them. His was a simple line drawing of the letter G enclosed in a line drawing of a football. The colors were added later, at the printers.

Also, the design morphed over the years. Gordon remembers his original as being pointier on the ends, an actual football shape, but the logo grew into more of a straightforward oval. He thinks that happened in 1964, when the Georgia Bulldogs asked for and received Lombardi’s permission to use the same logo on their helmets. The Bulldogs’ ended up with a rounder shaped logo, and the Packers soon moved in that direction, too.

“I don’t like this,” Gordon says of the newer design. “It lacks the symbolism of the football shape.”

It's commonly reported that the University of Georgia first modified the logo to make it rounder, but I've never seen anything to support it. I'd like to hear more from him.

I agree with Gordon that the original shape is better.

The outline could be thickened a little, but the football shape is superior to my eye.

It's funny; we think of the Packers' logo and uniforms as having been frozen in place since Lombardi's era. In reality, the original designs have been chipped away, bit by bit, until real differences emerge. This is one element that could easily be reclaimed; let the universities have the rounded logo, and bring back Gordon's original design.

"A Letter to Reckon With"

Jeff Ash of the Green Bay Press-Gazette sent me a note about this new video from St. Nobert College. It's about John Gordon, who as an art student at the college in 1961 designed the Packers' iconic "G" logo.

We've talked about this story before, but it's great to hear it from his own mouth.

I'm going to send Mr. Gordon an interview request; I have some new questions for him after seeing this video.

"Titletown Five" and the Preakness

Tomorrow will see the 138th running of the Preakness Stakes at Pimlico Race Course in Baltimore. All eyes will be on Orb as he tries to take his second race en route to the Triple Crown, but there's another horse in the field that every Packer fan should be watching.



"Titletown Five" is a 3-year-old dark bay colt co-owned by Packers Hall of Famers Paul Hornung and Willie Davis.

The colt's name is derived from a combination of the City of Green Bay's nickname and Hornung's jersey number. Hornung owns 30% of the horse, Davis reportedly slightly less, which might tell us why Paul gets to put his number on the horse.

His name is not the only connection Titletown Five has to the Packers; check out the green and gold silks worn by jockey Joel Rosario last July (pictured here with trainer D. Wayne Lukas:

Flickr/MattBritt00

That "G" logo looks great by itself on the side of a helmet, but just doesn't work when paired with another letter. They would have been better off using the Packers' interlocking "GB" logo instead.

The Preakness website shows slightly different silks, with a generic "GB". I don't know if that means the silks have been changed or if the graphic isn't 100% accurate. We'll have to see.

I find it ironic that Hornung is now part-owner of a racehorse, given his 1963 suspension for gambling.

Jockey Julien Leparoux will ride Titletown Five in tomorrow's race. He faces odds of 30-1, the longest in the Preakness, but I would never bet against the Golden Boy. He knew a thing or two about running in his day.

Success Has Another Father

The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel is reporting that the designer of the Packers' iconic helmet logo has come forward.

The story behind the 'G'

John Gordon, now an adjunct assistant professor of art at St. Norbert College, spoke Sunday on his involvement in the design of the Packers iconic "G" logo.

Gordon, 72, was an assistant equipment manager under "Dad" Braisher from 1960-'68, including working the majority of his tenure with Vince Lombardi. While he couldn't recall the exact date, Gordon said just before the start of the 1961 training camp that Braisher told him he had an art project for him.

The afternoon before, Lombardi had chosen Braisher to come up with a logo design for the Packers helmet. In a letter to Tom Murphy of the Green Bay Packer Hall of Fame in June 2010, Gordon explained his role.

"Since Dad was not an artist, he gave me the job and told me that he wanted the logo to consist of a letter "G" on a football-shaped background," Gordon wrote. "My response to his G on an oval idea went something like this: 'That's not a very creative idea, Dad. Why don't you let me do some experimenting?' "

Braisher was not interested in swaying from his original concept.

"Dad was very conservative and not much interested in the ideas of a young art student in the 1960s," Gordon wrote. "I have a clear sense that the concept was Dad's alone. But the actual configuration of the original image was mine."

Gordon said he had doubts about the shape of the "G" and the design, but the drawing he brought into the equipment room the next day pleased Braisher, was promptly approved by Lombardi and was sent to the printer to be made into decals.

"At the time, I was very nervous for Coach Lombardi to see it," Gordon said. "I don't want to diminish Dad's contribution, but the fact remains that Dad and I were both involved, and I'm proud to have been a part of it. I look at it as a collaborative effort."

Very interesting.

Longtime Packers equipment manager "Dad" Braisher is commonly given credit for the logo, but it makes sense that he would farm out the actual design to an assistant with the appropriate background.

"Dad" Braisher

Jeff Ash of the Green Bay Press-Gazette, points out that others have made this claim in the past.

Two Green Bay advertising guys, Ray Antil and Bill Moutrie, both now deceased, also said they helped Braisher design the logo.

One of Dad Braisher’s old friends came forward in 1998 and said none of those guys helped design the G logo. He said Braisher used to teach industrial arts and certainly would have been skilled enough to sketch the G after Vince Lombardi asked him to do so.

Ash also reports that he has "two solid sources" that tell him Gordon's claim is "the most credible of any of them." And, as he says, "Curious that he never said anything about it until now."

I agree. I'm going to reach out to Mr. Gordon – as might imagine, I have many questions for him.

Lions at Packers, 1960

Now that the Packers have beaten the Lions, preserving Detroit's losing streak in Wisconsin (22 straight games over 21 years!), we can enjoy this Press-Gazette photo gallery from 1960.

Here we see Jim Taylor (#31) running the ball. Taylor's 151 yards (only 16 shy of the then-team record) were the difference in this game.

I love the heavy sans-serif numbers on Vince Lombardi's earliest uniforms.

I'd love to see the Packers bring them back. With jerseys shrinking by the day, removing the extra serifs might preserve as much green space as possible.

Speaking of the numbers, take a look at this shot:

Did you notice the two different number fonts? Take a look at it again:

Check out the sevens on Henry Jordan (#74) and Bill Forester (#71). Jordan is wearing the serifed style, which the Packers first used in 1959, returned to around 1962 and still use today.


Other Packers also wore the serifed numbers, including Dave Hanner (#79). It seems strange to use today that you'd have a mix of old and new jerseys on the field at the same time, but all indications are that was fairly common in the early 1960s.

Below, we see quarterback Lamar McHan handing off to Taylor. McHan had been the Packers' starting quarterback at the beginning of 1959 before being pulled in favor of his backup, Bart Starr. As 1960 began, Starr and McHan alternated duties behind center.

In this game, it was all McHan.

Not to say that Starr didn't see any action on this October day. He held for Paul Hornung on the points after touchdown:

Always a team player, that Bart.

The Packers finished the season 8-4, top of the Western Conference, before falling to the Philadelphia Eagles in the championship game. In the locker room afterwards, Lombardi told the players "This will never happen again. You will never lose another championship."

And he was right. The Packers would return to the championship game the following season, with Bart Starr in all 14 games and with a new "G" logo on the side of their helmets. They also won the game against the Giants, 37-0, and Lombardi's dynasty was born.

1987 Training Camp Oddities

This photo from Training Camp in 1987 comes to us from Jeff Ash via Uni Watch.

It shows defensive end Carl Sullivan wearing a helmet with an upside-down "G" logo!

It also shows us how cost-conscious teams would re-use old gear in practice. From 1984 through 1988, the Packers wore a gold stripe down the middle of the Braisher stripes on their pants. That means that the pants Sullivan is wearing are at least four years old.

I don't know what's up with the missing white helmet stripe on #73's shell. I don't know that I've ever seen one missing stripe.

Bart and the Proto-G

What the heck is going on here?

Reader Jeff Flynn, Jr. sent this photo into Uni Watch this morning. That is, of course, the legendary Bart Starr wearing a leather helmet adorned with a very different "G" emblem than the one we're used to.

White with a narrow green outline, no background oval, the logo bears (if you will) a distinct resemblance to Chicago's "wishbone C" logo.

Was this a prototype, worked up by Dad Braisher before he created the now-iconic helmet logo? I'll see what I can find. Stay tuned.

"G" Still Stands for "Gullible"

Okay, this ought to put it to rest.

You'll remember, as we talked about two weeks ago, that Tiki Barber hosted a Yahoo! Sports video in which he claimed that the Packers' famous "G" helmet logo, designed for Lombardi by Gerald "Dad" Braisher, originally stood not for "Green Bay" but rather for "Greatness".

If you missed the original conversation, here's the video:

Of course, it's not true. Barber doesn't even get Braisher's name right - it was Gerald, not George.

It appears that, as I suspected, Tiki Barber got this little piece of knowledge from Wikipedia, where it was added by an anonymous author in June of 2010 (who failed, of course, to provide a source). It subsequently got picked up by Yahoo! Answers, answers.com, and dozens of other content-hungry sites which copy-and-paste text from Wikipedia. Not to menton countless blogs and message boards, all of which repeated it uncritically.

After Barber's video, the false assertion was removed from Wikipedia. Most of the inaccurate information eventually is, but the damage was done. Barber's little tidbit was out there, on all those sites.

The Sioux City Journal fanned the flames when it reprinted the falsehood as fact:

Leave it to Tiki Barber, the intrepid former star running back now turned broadcaster, to unveil information not many people – including myself – knew about the Green Bay Packers logo.

Like most, I assumed the familiar "G" stood for Green Bay. As in Wisconsin. Titletown U.S.A.

Nope.

According to Barber, and later verified by a google question search, the "G" actually stands for Greatness. Apparently, equipment manager George "Dad" Brashier[sic] thought up and designed the logo in 1961.

A google search? That's research?

And now, because the Sioux City Journal is a reputable, legitimate source, the bogus story has acquired the sheen of legitimacy. And so, back on Wikipedia it goes to confuse countless other lazy researchers.

An anonymous reader tipped me off to what we think is the origin of this nonsense. It comes from a 2003 DVD called Legend of Lambeau Field. In the chapter on the 1961 NFL Championship Game, the narrator intones:

"Lombardi added a 'G' to the Packers' helmet in 1961. And it stood for 'great.' The team posted the league's best record, and earned the right to host the championship game."

And that's it. A rhetorical flourish, and not even a good one. Picked up and repeated, until somebody believed it enough to put it on Wikipedia (while getting the actual word wrong).

Which is, as I said before, the problem with Wikipedia. Anybody can post any nonsense they please, and although it may eventually be removed, the damage can already be done.

Just to close out the story, MidwestSportsFans.com did what I should have done in the beginning, and asked the Packers. The team's response:

The Packers' Assistant Director of PR and Corporate Communications had the following to say: "There’s nothing in our history that suggests there's any truth to this. The Packers Hall of Fame archivist said the same thing."

And they really ought to have the final word.

Shooting Blanks

Uniform oddity from last night, as John Kuhn's helmet lost its logo in the first quarter.

We've seen decal issues before, although rarely with the Packers (the Bears use a thinner decal, suffering an inordinate amount of chipped, torn and broken helmet logos).

Jim Vilk, over on the Uni Watch blog comment thread, suggests that Kuhn "was just bringing out his inner Steeler." I'd prefer to think this was Kuhn's one-man throwback to the 1959-60 Packer squads of yore.

This is the third time during the 2010 playoffs that Kuhn has found himself with a helmet-related wardrobe malfunction. He briefly lost his neck bumper during the Atlanta game:

And in the NFC Championship Game, Kuhn's helmet logo took a bit of a beating (and check out Bears defensive tackle Matt Toeaina, #75, on the top of the pile):

And now a completely missing logo in the Super Bowl. Fortunately, a new decal was quickly applied to the side of his helmet, and Kuhn's unintentional tribute was quietly retired.

(h/t: Uni Watch)

"G" Stands For "Gullible"

Several readers have emailed me about this video making the rounds, with Tiki Barber "schooling" the current Packers on the origins of their helmet logo.

So now we know - "Dad" Braisher meant the "G" to stand for "Greatness," not "Green Bay". A little extra motivation from Vince Lombardi to his players, What a fascinating discovery. The unknown tale behind an iconic logo, so little-known that the team itself isn't aware of it. What a great story.

There's just one problem.

It's not true.

It's not supported. There's no source. Not as though there's a lack of material on the subject. Dozens if not hundreds of books on Lombardi's tenure somehow managed to miss this factoid, and I can't find any contemporary evidence to support it. Where did Tiki get that idea? Wikipedia, of course.

It's gone now, but the Packers page used to include this little nugget. Or, heck, it might be back again, as dedicated editors have to keep removing it.

A Google search pulls up pages of results, all of which are recent and all of which lead... right back to Barber. Or to Wikipedia.

This is my problem with Wikipedia. It's a great clearing house for references; read up on a subject and follow the sources, but don't believe anything that isn't supported. Sure, eventually much of the misleading or outright false information will eventually be removed. But until it is, those false claims are picked up and repeated as fact by lazy journalists.

Or even by lazy former football players-turned-journalists.


(h/t: Lori Wojciechowski, Kyla Briney)

A Little Mystery (UPDATED)

One of the best things about running this blog is the response I get from Packer fans far and wide. It's an amazing community, and I'm honored by those who read and follow this blog.

I was recently contacted by St. Vincent de Paul in Green Bay, looking for a little help in solving a mystery. Somebody donated an old Packers helmet (as you might expect, they get their share of old Packers treasure), and they were looking to learn a little bit about it before putting it on eBay.

Helmets are not my strength, but I'm not averse to a little research, and I love a good mystery. Maybe you can help me learn a little more about it.

The helmet is in rough shape, but it's still a beauty.

This is what they had to say about it:

From what we can tell the helmet is a 60's style helmet but no one wore the number 54 in the 60's. In 1970 Walker had it and 1971 Winther had it. I guess our main question is if the Packers used these helmets into the mid 70's. In 1973 Larry McCarren wore the number and he is a local hero being a sportscaster and all. When did the packers use decals for the numbers on the back of the helmet?

Also the decals on the helmet are different. The one on the left side is 1 piece and the one on the right side has a G decal ontop of a white oval decal.

You can see here how the two-layer decal is revealed. The white "G" has been scraped away, revealing the green field below. Compared this to the even scrapes in the top photo. The single-layer decals appear to have been introduced around 1970 (we do know that the double-layer were still in use as of the 1968 Pro Bowl).

The shell itself is comprised of several pieces of Acrylonitrile Butadiene Styrene, joined with tight seams. Riddell bought its ABS from the Marbon Corporation, under the trade name "Kra-Lite".



The construction appears to match, so far as we can tell from these types of photographs, the helmet worn by Forrest Gregg in the 1968 Pro Bowl:

We'll definitely need to get a closer look at the stickers inside, which often contain date of manufacture and other information. On the back, we have large black number decals.


There's the Kra-Lite mark, although we can't tell if there are any numbers after the trade name, which might help us date it.

The number decals appear to date from the early 1970s, when they replaced the Lombardi-era stenciled numbers. This game photo from 1973 shows similar decals:

So we have number decals from the early 1970s, logo decals spanning two different years. I suspect this helmet was originally used in the late 1960s and recycled into the 1970s. The two different helmet logos might tend to support this, as the team might have replaced decals only when they showed enough wear to need it. It's certainly possible that Larry McCarren might have worn it in 1973.


UPDATE: The responses have been great so far. I received this email from an anonymous collector:

Just thought I could help you out in identifying the Packers helmet. I am a collector of vintage football helmets and I have some info you may find valuable.

First of all the the helmet is the Riddell, "TK2" (Tru Kurv) model, which would have had either a 12 point, canvas suspension interior like this Packer helmet:

or a six point canvas suspension like this Browns helmet:

It dates from the early to mid 60's as is evident from the six air holes in the top of the helmet. The font of the Riddell stamping on the back of the helmet is from the late 60's to early 70's so it may have been reconditioned (the sticker in the interior looks like a reconditioning certification sticker) and therefore may have an additional stamping underneath the current paint. They wore this style helmet throughout the entire 70's at which time Riddell stopped making the suspension model and went to strictly foam and air padding.

As far as the decals go, you can tell the two piece decal has slightly squatter, more pointed ends or football shaped. It is the older 50's and 60's style. The other one piece decal is more oval shaped and is the style from the 70's.

Excellent stuff. Thanks!

I also received additional photographs from St. Vincent de Paul in response to my query, highlighting the back and interior markings. Click for larger:

Uncropped back pic

Inside sticker #1

Inside Sticker #2

Only stamp inside of helmet very back and bottom where the green and white stripes fold over

Left newer logo

Right older logo

Love the differences between the two logos. You can really see the difference between the thinner outline of the older football-shaped logo and the thicker outline of the modern ellipse.

Once again, much more to come....

Forrest Gregg's 1968 Pro Bowl helmet

As the NFL plays its Pro Bowl today, we look back at an earlier game convention that has fallen by the wayside.

Today, all players wear their individual team helmets with their conference uniforms. That wasn't always the case - before the early 1990s, players would wear dark helmets with white conference logos - blue for the NFC, red for the AFC. For a period before the NFL/AFL merger, Pro Bowlers from both teams wore gold helmets, with the NFL logo on each side and center stripes in the conference color (Western Conference teams such as the Packers wore blue and white stripes, while representatives of the Eastern Conference wore red and white stripes).

In those days, players brought their own helmets to the Pro Bowl which were then altered, such as this helmet worn by Forrest Gregg in the 1968 Pro Bowl game:

What's particularly interesting about this helmet is what it tells us about the Packers' iconic helmet logo. You can clearly see that it is comprised of two separate decals - the green ellipse and white "G" each stand out in relief under the gold spray paint (the team decals were removed entirely from the left side).

I don't know when the Packers moved to the single-layer decal they wear now, but it appears to have been after 1968.

UPDATE 02/17: Helmet Hut has a great article about this helmet on their website, including a color photo of Gregg in the 1968 Pro Bowl.