Among the pleasures of researching this book was the chance to spend time with older and wiser people. Fred Russell, the sportswriting sage of Nashville, showed remarkable recall more than sixty years later of a Vanderbilt road game against Fordham at the Polo Grounds in 1934. I found a new writing hero in the process, W. C. “Bill” Heinz, who wrote the first book about Vince Lombardi, Run to Daylight!—the coach’s memoir of a week during the 1962 season. From the moment I met Heinz at his hilltop home in Dorset, Vermont, and he showed me his old Remington typewriter and shared notes from interviews he conducted with Lombardi thirty-seven years ago, I realized that I was in the presence of a true pro.
For the winter of 1996-97 my wife and I moved to Green Bay to research the book. We will long remember the clear northern winter, the amazing run of thePackers to the Super Bowl under coach Mike Holmgren and general manager Ron Wolf, and the warm people we met during our stay. Our deepest thanks to Gary and Donna DeBauche, our local guides; to Ron and Helen Desotel, who provided us with a wonderful home in the bayside woods of rural Brussels; to Jack and Rita Earp, our friendly neighbors (Jack, great-grandnephew of Wyatt Earp, rode his tractor snowplow like a horseman); to Judy, the postmistress who delivered our mail through blizzards; to the irrepressible Johnny Maino and Larry McCarren, Michael Bauman, Bud Lea and Art Daley, who welcomed me into the Packer media tribe; to Lee Remmel and his skilled staff at Lambeau; to Vernon Biever, the great photographer; and to Mary Jane Herber at the Brown County Library, whose research assistance was invaluable.
Our two summers of research in New York City were made possible by Robin Becker, the graceful dancer of West 107th Street, and Tom Chulak, my loving cousin. Researchers Gloria Riviera, Ben Maraniss and Libby Estelle were quick and efficient. It was a pleasure to deal with Allen Aimone, the skilled special collections librarian at West Point, Suzanne Christoff, the USMA archivist, and Pat Hanlon, media relations director for the New York Giants. Vic Del Guercio taught me about the Depression-era Fordham. Don Crane and the McPartland brothers brought back the Saints. Tim Cohane Jr. provided me with two blue tubs full of his father’s papers. And Joe Lombardi, the Old Man’s sweet-natured little brother, showed me around Sheepshead Bay. Michael and Beth Norman, Blaine Harden and Jessica Kowal, Chip Brown and Kate Betts gave us plenty of happy diversions, and Beth, a professor of nursing, also helped as a medical adviser, along with Dr. Dorothy Scott.
Although this was not an authorized biography, the Lombardi family welcomed my project and provided a balanced perspective on St. Vince. His son, Vincent, daughter-in-law, Jill, and daughter, Susan, were open and honest, and I will never forget their generosity. Cousin Clara Parvin and niece Michelle Walden went out of their way to find family photographs. Among the old Packers, special thanks to Bob Skoronski for his incisive comments and to Paul Hornung, who tracked me down in a Louisville hotel room one night and showed that the Golden Boy is a helluva guy.
Vincent H. Lombardi, representing management, and David Meggyesy, representing the union, once almost came to blows on opposite sides of an NFL bargaining table, yet I admire them both greatly. Meggyesy’s thoughts on the meaning of football in American culture are always interesting. Thanks to Jim Warren for introducing me to Meggyesy and for providing a clear reading of the manuscript. Preliminary readings by Richard Cohen, Valerie Strauss and Maralee Schwartz gave me an early boost, as did Andrea Dettelbach’s energetic research and the art history exuberance of Paul Richard. I am always lucky to have Bob Woodward, Elsa Walsh, Michael Weisskopf, Judith Katz, Frank Roloff, Neil Henry and John Feinstein looking out for me. The memos that Dick Harwood wrote after reading the manuscript were always insightful.
The Washington Post was extraordinarily accommodating throughout this project. Don Graham, Leonard Downie Jr., Robert Kaiser, Steve Coll, Karen DeYoung and Bill Hamilton let me keep going on Lombardi even as my former subject, Bill Clinton, found new (or old) ways to make news. George Solomon, the sports editor, generously allowed me to cover the Packers during their 1996 championship run.Post researcher Bobbye Pratt once again was a lifesaver. Rafe Sagalyn, my agent, believed in this book from the beginning and was greatly helpful, as were his assistants, Ethan Kline and Dan Kois. This is my fourth book for Alice Mayhew at Simon & Schuster, our first sports book. She can be as tough as Lombardi, and as smart and loving. Thanks also to Carolyn Reidy, David Rosenthal, Victoria Meyer, Kerri Kennedy, Jennifer Thornton, Charlotte Gross, Roger Labrie and Layla Hearth. Near the end of any book, my absentmindness turns to outright carelessness. This time I lost a computer disk with the entire book on it while riding the Metroliner from Washington to New York. Amtrak’s Cliff Black to the rescue. He sent a team of employees onto the empty train hours later and miraculously found the disk.
There is nothing that means more to me than having my parents, Mary and Elliott Maraniss, serve as the first readers and editors for my two biographies, and this time they were joined in the process by the Maraniss family’s adopted big sister, Whitney Gould, whose comments were all the more valuable because she has no use for football. And thanks finally to Linda, Andrew and Sarah. Linda lived this book as much as I did, moving to Green Bay in the dead of winter and to New York in the brutal summer, and everything I did depended on her incredible support and invariably correct editorial advice. As I wrote once before, paraphrasing the old coach, and say again at the end of my obsession with Lombardi, she and our children are not everything, they are the only thing.
Index
ABC
Adamany, Wally
Adderley, Herb
Agnew, Spiro
Air Force Academy
Alabama, University of
Alda, Alan
Aldridge, Lionel
Allen, George
Allouez, Claude
Ambury, James
Ameche, Alan “The Horse,”
Amen, Paul
America
America First
American Football League (AFL)
American Management Association
American Medical Association
American Professional Football
Association
Anderson, Dave
Anderson, Donny
Anderson, Jackie
Anderson, Lewis B.
Andrie, George
Angell, James Rowland
Anthony of Padua, Saint
anticommunism
Antil, Mary
Antil, Mary Jo
Antil, Ray
Antiquarian Society
antisemitism
Appley, Lawrence A.
Arbanas, Fred
Arcade
Arkansas, University of
Army, U.S.
Corps of Engineers of
896th Engineer Floating Bridge Company of
Signal Corps of
Third Army of
Twelfth Infantry Regiment of the Fourth Division of
Army Athletic Association
Army football team:
Blaik as head coach of
Columbia vs.
glory days of
impact of honor code scandal on
Navy vs.
rough playing reputation of
VL as assistant coach of
Arnett, Jon
Aronson, Harry
Arps, Milton
Arrowhead Inn
Assmuth, Joseph
Associated Press (AP)
Atkins, Doug
Atkinson, Jerry
Atlanta Falcons
Austin, Bill
Babartsky, Al
Bachman, Dorothy
Bald, Cannonball
Ballweg, Larry
Baltimore Colts
Green Bay Packers vs.
New York Giants vs.
Bamfield, Landon
Baptista, Sister Louise “the Bap,”
Barnes, Erich
Barris, John
Barthes, Roland
Bartlett, B. W.
Baughan, M
axie
Baum, Bernie
Baum, Henry
Baum, Robert
Beacon Hill Country Club
Bealmear, Austin
Bear, Ray
Bear Mountain Inn
Bednarik, Chuck
Bell, Bobby
Bell, deBenneville “Bert,”
Bell, Tommy
Bengston, John Philip “Phil,”
VL succeeded as Green Bay coach by
Bergen Evening Record
Berlin wall
Berra, Yogi
Berry, Raymond
Bettis, Tom
Bickham, Margaret Ann (granddaughter)
Bickham, Marie Ann (granddaughter)
Bickham, Paul (son-in-law)
Bickham, Paul, Jr. (grandson)
Biever, John
Biever, Vernon
Big Elroy
Bilotti brothers
Blackbourn, Lisle
Blaik, Bob
Blaik, Earl H. “Red,”
Army football team coached by
Bull Pond fishing vacations of
character and personality of
coaching style and strategy of
criticism of
honor code scandal and
MacArthur and
retirement of
Ten Football Axioms of
two-platoon system of
VL influenced by
VL’s relationship with
Blaik, Merle
Blair Motion Pictures Inc.
Blanchard, Doc
Blasco Ibáñez, Vicente
Bledsoe, Terry
Blindauer, Howie
Boston College
Bosworth, Brian
Bouche, Bruce
Bourguignon, Dick
Bourguignon, Lois
Bowman, Ken
Boyd, Bob
Boyle, Connie
Brackins, Charlie
Bradlee, Ben
Bradlee, Dino
Bradley, Hugh
Bradley University
Braisher, Dad
Brandt, Ben
Brandt, Gil
Bratkowski, Zeke
Brecht, Bertolt
Breslin, Eddie
Broder, David
Brodie, John
Bronx Buick Company
Bronx Zoo
Brooklyn Dodgers
Brooklyn Eagle
Brooklyn Eagles
Brooklyn-Long Island Social Club
Brooklyn Prep high school
Brooklyn Tech high school
Brookshier, Tom
Brosnan, Jim
Brown, Ed
Brown, Jim
Brown, Larry
Brown, Paul
Brown, Roger
Brown, Roosevelt “Rosie,”
Brown, Tim
Brown, Tom
Brown, Wilburt S. “Bigfoot,”
Brown University
Brusky, Eugene
Bryant, Paul “Bear,”
Buchwald, Art
Buck, Jack
Budde, Ed
Buffalo Bills
Buffone, Doug
Bunn, Edward
Buol, Vern
Burk, Adrian
Burke, Dennis
Butler, Billy
Cabrera, Jim
Caesar, Sid
Caffey, Lee Roy
Calhoun, George B.
California, University of, at Los Angeles (UCLA)
Callahan, Charlie
Camp, Walter
Camp Alverno
Canadeo, Tony
VL and
Canadian Football League
Cannon, James
Carberry, Judge
Carey, Hugh
Carley, David
Carmelite fathers
Caroline, J. C.
Carpenter, Lew
Casares, Rick
Cathedral Annual
Cathedral College of the Immaculate Conception
VL as student and athlete at
Catholic Herald Citizen
Caulkin, Francis
Cavanaugh, Frank
CBS
Cerutti, Hooks
Chandler, Don
Chicago, Ill.
Chicago, University of
Chicago Bears
Green Bay Packers vs.
New York Giants vs.
Chicago Cardinals
Chicago Tribune
China, People’s Republic of
Chomsky, Noam
Christian Mothers Society
Christian Science Monitor
Church of Our Lady of Refuge
Cincinnati, University of
Clark, DeDe
Clark, Jack
Clarke, Frank
Clay, Cassius
Cleveland Browns
Green Bay Packers vs.
New York Giants vs.
Cochran, John Thurman “Red,”
Cochran, Pat
Coffey, Jack
Coffey, Robert
Cohane, Margaret
Cohane, Mary Therese
Cohane, Timothy
character and personality of
family life of
sportswriting of
VL’s relationship with
Cold War
College All-Star Games
College All-Star teams
college football:
criticism of
decline of
overemphasis and glorification of
physical and mental challenge of
press coverage of
pro football vs.
questionable recruiting methods in
Collier, Blanton
Collier, Jim
Collins, Arthur S., Jr.
Collins, Mary Ann
Colo, Don
Colorado College
Columbia Military Academy
Columbia University
School of Journalism at
Columbia University football team
Army vs.
Committee to Re-elect the President
Commonweal
Conerly, Charlie
Congress, U.S.
see also Senate, U.S.
Cooke, Terence Cardinal
Corcoran, Mickey
Cordileone, Lou
Cornell University
Corum, Bill
Cosell, Howard
Cosmopolitan
Coughlin, Charles
Cox, Ignatius Wiley
Crane, Don
Crane, Jack “Jocko,”
Creighton University
Crow, Lindon
Crowley, Agnes Sweeney
Crowley, James H., “Sleepy Jim,”
character and personality of
football playing career of
Fordham football team coached by
Cuozzo, Gary
Currie, Dan
Curry, Bill
Cvercko, Andy
Dale, Carroll
Daley, Art (Green Bay Press-Gazette)
Daley, Arthur (New York Times)
Daley, Richard
Dallas Cowboys
Doomsday Defense of
Green Bay Packers vs.
Landry as coach of
Dallas Rangers
Dallas Texans
Dallas Times-Herald
Danowski, Edward F.
Danzig, Allison
Dartmouth College
Davey, Martin L.
Davis, Al
Davis, Glenn
Davis, Willie
Dawson, Len
Dean, Ted
Death of a Salesman (Miller)
DeGasperis, John “Gassy,”
Del Greco, Al
Del Guercio, Vic
Democratic Party
Dempsey, Jack
Depression, Great
Detroit Lions
Green Bay Packers vs.
Devore, Hugh
Dewane, Tom
Dickson, George
; Dinius, Duane
Direct Selling Association
Disegni, George
Dobie, Gil
Doheny, Dick
Doll, Don
Dolson, Frank
Dooley, Edwin B.
Dorsey, Tommy
Dowler, Boyd
Draper, Phil
Draper, Stephen
Druze, Johnny
Duke University
Dulkie, Joe
Dumont Television Network
Duncan, Randy
Dunney, Howard
Dupre, L. G.
Eastern College Athletic Association
East-West Shrine Game
Ebbets Field
Ebert, John
Ed Sullivan Show, The
Egan, J. P.
Eisenhower, Dwight D.
elections:
of 1952
of 1960
of 1968
Ellis Island
Englewood, N.J.
juvenile delinquency in
MacKay Park in
Englewood Dwight Morrow High School
Englewood Press
E. P. Dutton
Equitable Insurance Company
Erasmus Hall
ESPN
Esquire
Evashevski, Forrest
Ewbank, Weeb
Facenda, John
Fair Haven, N.J.
Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI)
Federation Bank and Trust
Ferguson, Howie
“Fern Hill” (Thomas)
Ferry, Lou
Filipski, Gene
Fitzsimmons, Sunny Jim
Fleming, Marv
Flynn, George
Ford, John
Ford, Richard
Ford, Whitey
Fordham Glee Club
Fordham Ram
“Fordham Ram, The,”
Fordham University
baseball team of
boarding vs. day students at
demanding curriculum and discipline of
Jesuit faculty and administration of
Law School of
Purdue vs.
Ratio Studiorum curriculum of
Rose Hill campus and buildings of
St. Mary’s vs.
social life and dating at
VL honored by
VL’s academic career at
Fordham University football Rams:
Crowley as head coach of
discontinuation of
national reknown of
New York University vs.
press coverage of
publicity department of
radio broadcasts of
Rameses VII, team mascot of
semipro ball played by members of
Seven Blocks of Granite of
Seven Samsons of
University of Pittsburgh vs.
VL as assistant coach of
VL’s playing career for
wartime suspension of
Forester, Bill “Bubba,”
When Pride Still Mattered Page 78
