The episode delves into the eclectic and fascinating history of the All American Football Conference (AAFC) training camps, featuring insights from football archaeology founder Timothy Brown. We explore the unique convergence of disparate elements, including a towering wooden statue, a Cistercian monastery, and a once-forgotten football league, all of which played a role in the burgeoning landscape of professional football in the mid-20th century. The narrative unfolds around the various locales that hosted these training camps, illustrating how communities vied for the opportunity to attract professional teams, often through elaborate gestures and local support. Notably, we examine the curious case of the Chicago Rockets and their ambitious yet ultimately unsuccessful attempt to establish a lasting presence in Two Rivers, Wisconsin, underscored by the construction of a 35-foot tall football player statue. This episode serves as a testament to the rich tapestry of football history, revealing the intricate connections that have shaped the sport we know today.

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Well, long before the luxury air conditioned facilities, pro football teams bent over backwards, literally to find the ultimate remote summer home.

Today we're digging up the wild history of the AAFC training camps with football archaeology founder Timothy Brown.

Tim, welcome to the Pig Penn.

Hey there.

Look forward to chatting once again.

And I would invite your listeners to sit back and listen to a tall tale.

To a tall tale.

I think it's going to be like an all American tall tale.

That's right.

All American there is.

That's right.

Well, it's really all American in this case because you wrote a tidbit recently called Standing Tall among the AFC preseason camps.

That's the only All American football conference, if I'm not mistaken.

And so we'd love to hear about this story.

Yeah, yeah.

So just to set it up a little bit, there's, you know, preseason camp.

I mean, there's a reason they call it training camp and it's because people literally used to go camping during the preseason, you know, or they go out to some cottage or you know, whatever it would be.

But they, you know, before the college opened, the team, you know, would go off to some, you know, camp along some river or go to some place where there's like cabins or whatever, but to get away.

And it was kind of a whole thing of like training and training table early on was really a kind of a, it was like a spartan existence.

You know, you couldn't smoke, you couldn't have alcohol.

There's some other things you were supposed to not do as well, but.

And then, you know, a lot of teams had these kind of bizarre diet, diets kind of like, you know, we have all these bizarre dietary fads now and then coaches and trainers had weird ideas like don't eat cauliflower or whatever.

You know, there really were some kind of bizarre ideas.

But, you know, so it was a way to get it, get, get all the, get the team together, a little build a little camaraderie.

But there wasn't really, you know, initially training camp was not about football.

It was more about long walks, swimming, stretching out.

You know, maybe they'd do some falling on the football drills.

But it was, you know, a lot of times they didn't even bring a football out there.

It's just all about you know, kind of getting your body going again now.

So the colleges did it, had training camp, you know, for 30 years or whatever.

And then when the.

And, you know, at that time, the only pro teams were in the Northeast and the Midwest and at least, you know, the NFL type teams.

So they typically capped someplace that was cooler.

So New York had a fair amount.

Wisconsin, Minnesota, Michigan.

You know, that's where people would try to go just to.

There were lakes, there were cottages and cooler weather.

So then, you know, now.

Now hardly anybody.

There's like, Dallas is the only team that travels more than an hour away from their home stadium to have.

They go to California, right?

Dallas does.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

And, you know, because everybody else is all focused on, you know, stay in town.

They got indoor training facilities or outdoor, but, you know, they got all their weight equipment, all their other training and medical and whatever, you know, so.

And, you know, I can see it, that it makes sense, but.

But, you know, back in.

Right after World War II, the AAFC got started.

And so it was one of those things where all of a sudden we've got eight new teams, eight new pro football teams, and they're all looking for a place to have training camp.

And so some of them, like.

Some of them plan to stay close to where they were based.

But for some reason, like, eight of five, five of the eight ended up, like, in the Midwest, I'm sorry, in the Northwest or in California maybe, that was to allow them to scrimmage a little bit.

And they played some preseason games out there, too, but they all, you know, so they end up out there.

So Bend, Oregon was one of the locations, and they.

They hosted the Brooklyn Dodgers.

And so.

And they had, like, there was this competition among these towns trying to, you know, how do we get one of these teams?

And so Bend, Oregon, guaranteed, you know, like, $9,000 in gate receipts for, you know, preseason scrimmages.

They gave the team country club privileges at the local Bend Country Club or whatever it was out there.

And then they also had, like, a discounted hotel and resort stays.

Then you had the Buffalo Bison up in your neck of the woods, and they were supposed to train at Saint Bonaventure, but then Saint Bonaventure had so many veterans returning from the war that they didn't have you know, dormitory space, whatever.

So then they said, okay, we're gonna go.

And they.

They instead found a place in Oconomowoc, Wisconsin.

And I can pronounce that only because I grew up maybe 40 miles east of there.

I just heard you say it, and I don't think I could pronounce it.

Yeah, well, one of my.

And I wrote it in the article, but there.

There was a company that was based in New York City, and for some reason they had like a branch in Oconomowoc and no one could pronounce it, so they called it Wisconsin 5o instead.

Like Hawaii 5o.

But anyways, so they found a place that, you know, some lumber baron or some guy who made a boatload of money from Chicago, he built this place on this lake outside of Oconomowoc.

And then that eventually became like a.

A seminary or amongst.

You know, there are a bunch of monks living there.

But apparently they had some extra space, maybe a shortage of monks.

And so then they.

So the Buffalo Bison ended up there for a year.

And, you know, and again, the city opened their arms and, you know, gave them access to the high school training, the high school field and the armory and, you know, whatever.

But kind of the.

The key part of the story is the Chicago Rockets.

So they spent the 46 preseason in Santa Rosa, California, but then Two Rivers, Wisconsin, enticed them for the 47 season.

And for those who don't know, Two Rivers, it's about 40 miles southeast of Green Bay, so it's on Lake Michigan.

I'm sure it's pretty low town.

I don't think I've ever been there.

Maybe I've driven past it.

But.

So they were all eager and they had had.

The Eagles had been there, like the Chicago or.

No, the Columbus Bulldogs.

There'd been a couple of, you know, teams that had trained there in the past.

They're like, man, we gotta.

We gotta find a way to keep.

Attract additional teams and.

And keep the Rockets.

So what they did is they built this massive.

Well, they built a sign as you drive into town, and it had this big Chicago Rockets football player who was like 35ft tall.

And there was a local guy who kind of designed it, and his cousin was vacationing in town who was an art teacher at a high school in Milwaukee.

So he apparently did the artwork, which wasn't that great.

There's.

There's an image of a postcard.

They issued postcards showing this big giant football player.

And anyways, that's in the story itself, but despite their best efforts and the welcome sign and building the 35 foot Chicago Rocket football player, they left town after one year and instead went to Ripon, Wisconsin.

So anyways, it's just, you know, if you're, if you're trying to attract an NFL team or somebody else, having a sign, having a 35 foot player on the outskirts of town is probably not the secret.

So it used to work for the, the Greeks and Romans, I think then they build giant statues and Babylonians and.

Yeah, yeah, well, I helped him win, that's for sure.

Yeah.

Yeah.

At least if you're a Trojan, that's, that's one strategy.

Wow.

I mean, that's something I guess we take for granted, you know, these, you know, long distance training camps like you said, you know, but it's, it really is a great time.

I know, I know high schools are still doing it, but they're, you know, our local high schools do it just outside of town and, but it gets the, the guys together and you know, get some, like you said, thinking on the same page and becoming a team.

You know, it's a team bonding session more than anything.

But, you know, you think about that and you pair that with a league that hasn't existed for, you know, 70 some years since.

Really, really a cool story.

And to hear, you know, most people have never heard of the Chicago Rockets.

And uh, they were never very good.

If I, I don't know if I ever have a winning record those four years of the afc, but they were one of the bottom dwellers, I think.

Yeah, you know, they, it's a funny thing.

Like even, you know, when I, when I was in college, we didn't have.

Well, we had the Milwaukee Bucks trained at our, at our place, you know, and you know, but there were the NFL, a lot of teams, you know, trained in Wisconsin or Minnesota or, you know, I think upstate New York probably had a fair amount and it was just like a normal, normal thing.

I mean that's pretty much standard operating procedure and then it just like it has just disappeared.

But yeah, I'm not, not 100 sure.

It just, you know, maybe it's just the, they just don't feel the need to get away and you know, haul all their equipment and there's just too much stuff now.

You know, I think that must be it.

But it can't be.

I mean, people used to just fight over, you know, getting, getting a pro team there because there's a, you know, tourist attraction thing.

It was Got your.

Your town name in the newspaper, but, you know.

Yeah, no more.

I know.

I went a couple years ago, PFRA had their convention down in Pittsburgh and it was right at the same time we went to the Latrobe Museum because it had a big display on John Brailier and you know, the Latrobe Athletic Club.

Well, that was the third day of the Steelers training camp.

They go to St. Vincent College in Latrobe, which is about 45, 45 miles, 45 minutes of east of Pittsburgh, basically.

And so that was the first time I ever went to a pro training camp and it was actually kind of cool.

But they, they stay in the dorms there, the Steelers do.

I think they're one of the rare ones that go to a college.

I think the Bills might go to Saint Bonaventure.

You talked about the.

The Bisons going there, but I think the Bills might still go to St. Bonnie's but yeah, that's kind of a neat thing.

And I know they had an article last year with Aaron Rodgers going there.

He had never experienced that before since he was in college.

And you know, I'm sure the dorms aren't super nice.

Like these guys are used to living they.

But in a room and up with somebody and makes it real interesting.

I've got a kind of an internal.

There's a playbook and then some like internal documents From like the 53 cults, something like that.

But there's, you know, like they always have these training rules and all those documents.

And one of them during preseason camp, it basically is saying, stay away from the campus women.

I forget exactly the wording, but it was very clear message.

Stay away.

Yeah, we want to be able to come back.

And they didn't.

Didn't want any concerns, I think.

I don't think school's even in session at St. Vincent when the Steelers are down there because they take.

I mean, it's.

It's a pretty big thing now.

It's.

They've got like four or five football fields there.

They're named or Rooney Field.

And it's, you know, half that campus is centered around the Steelers, I think now.

And probably they gave him a bunch of money too for.

But yeah, pretty interesting stuff.

So, yeah, this is a, you know, one of those unique things that you talk about that, you know, might not be common to the average football historian or fan or a reader.

But you take us back and you take us in these little nooks and crannies of football that make it such a special game and that you do this in your tidbits and maybe you could share with the listeners where they too can take in some of your work.

Yeah, sure.

Just go to footballarchaeology.com it's a substack site and you can either you can subscribe, in which case you'll get an email every time I follow something new, or you can follow, which means it'll pop up on your app on the substack app.

Kind of similar to any, any social media platform.

Yeah, you know, that's kind of the best thing.

Otherwise, just, you know, bookmark it and come and visit whenever you feel like.

It's all right, Tim.

Well, we love it when you visit us each Tuesday, and we'd love to have you visit again next Tuesday to talk about some more great football history.

Very good.

Look forward to it.

That's all the football history we have today, folks.

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