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posted 09/09/2007
It has been a great 50 years....
For hallowed Lambeau Field, that is...the longest continuously occupied venue in the National Football League, which this year is celebrating a half-century of existence.
The list of its memorable moments, launched in 1957 when it was known as "new Green Bay City Stadium," is both long and impressive.
Unforgettably, it has been host to the storied "Ice Bowl," when the thermometer registered a frigid 13 degrees below zero, the coldest temperature ever recorded for an NFL contest.
Such was the impact of that 1967 classic, staged on New Year's Eve afternoon, it later was voted the greatest game in pro football history.
And, in two separate polls, twice has been voted the greatest game in the Packers' own 88-year history.
"Lambeau" likewise has been the site of two NFL championship games, in 1961 and 1965, including the Ice Bowl, before City Stadium "became" Lambeau Field.
Those three titles were among the five presided over by Vince Lombardi during his nine-year Green Bay tenure as head coach (1959-67). The Packers returned from New York in 1962 and Dallas in 1966 with NFC Championships, the latter the final NFL crown the Packers acquired before defeating the AFL Champion Kansas City Chiefs in the first Super Bowl two weeks later.
Lambeau also hosted a fourth NFC (formerly NFL) Championship game following the 1996 season, sweeping past Carolina, 30-13, en route to Super Bowl XXXI.
Championships aside, "Lambeau" also has provided the backdrop for the highest scoring game in the history of "Monday Night Football," a 48-47 pointfest which saw the Packers shade the Washington Redskins on the balmy night of Oct. 17, 1983, amid a joint harvest of 11 touchdowns and six field goals.
Earlier, the Green and Gold joined the Baltimore Colts in forging the first overtime game in franchise history - a taut and intense Western Conference playoff in 1965, with the Packers wresting a narrow 13-10 decision from the Hosses on Don Chandler's field goal at 13:39 of OT.
All of these, happily, were successes. But hardly a novelty to the Packers, who have done rather well in Lambeau's cozy confines over their 50-year residency.
In fact, the record shows they have won 155 games while losing 99 and tying 4, numbers which figure out to a substantial .609 winning percentage.
They have had even better fortune in postseason competition at home, winning 12 of 14 playoff games, for a more imposing .857 percentage.
Known as City Stadium for its first eight years, it became Lambeau Field in 1965. Team Founder Earl "Curly" Lambeau died on June 1 of that year and the Stadium Commission renamed the stadium in his honor on Sept. 11, 1965.
Lambeau, one of the most successful mentors in NFL history, had coached the team for its first 30 years (1919-1949), leading it to six NFL titles and more than 200 victories.
However, it was under Lombardi in the early years of the television age, that the Packers focused the national spotlight on Green Bay while hosting a playoff game for the first time in 1961. And they were quick to capitalize on the opportunity.
Setting about the task with impressive intensity, they swept to a 24-0 first-quarter lead on the way to a 37-0 rout, thus posting what remains the largest postseason victory margin in team annals.
Paul Hornung, on leave from the Army, enjoyed a career day. He tied a playoff record by scoring 19 points to trigger the Packers' triumph over New York's Eastern Conference champion Giants.
In all, the Packers scored seven times against the NFL's top defensive team, posting four touchdowns and three field goals.
Meanwhile, the Green Bay defense proved to be a dominating complement, intercepting four passes and recovering one fumble, while limiting the Giants to six first downs and 130 total yards.
In 1965, when the Packers scored their second NFL title victory in then City Stadium, they took substantial advantage of the weather to secure their third championship in five years.
After four inches of snow had softened the field surface on game day morning of Jan. 2, 1966, the Packers employed their running game to forge past Jim Brown and the Cleveland Browns, 23-12.
The "Thunder and Lightning" duo of Hornung and Jim Taylor rolled up 201 yards rushing on the stadium's soggy turf to help the Packers overcome an early 9-7 Cleveland lead.
The Packers' defense, meanwhile, allowed only 50 yards to the redoubtable Jim Brown, the league's leading rusher with 1,544 yards during the year.
Quarterback Bart Starr finally settled the muddy, seesaw struggle in the third quarter on a 90-yard, 11-play drive, capped when Hornung scored on a 13-yard sweep around the Browns' right perimeter.
Two years later, on the same field, the "Ice Bowl" obviously presented different weather problems. Football seldom has been played in sub-zero temperatures.
As a consequence, game officials could not use their whistles and one of them reportedly tore the skin from his lips while blowing his whistle.
The Packers also cancelled band performances after noticing blood on a few of the musicians' faces.
Officially, meanwhile, the field's new $80,000 heating system failed due to cold. Unofficially, some suggested Lombardi turned it off.
Subsequently, on the frozen turf, Starr's decisive touchdown play, "35 wedge," called for fullback Chuck Mercein to get the ball.
Nobody expected Starr to keep it, a decision he privately made while preparing to call the fateful play as the Packers trailed 17-14 at the Dallas 1-yard line with only 13 seconds remaining in the game.
Starr's dive, behind right guard Jerry Kramer and center Ken Bowman, clinched a third straight Green Bay championship and ended the Ice Bowl.
Forty years later, it remains the most celebrated quarterback sneak in pro football history.
Another quarterback, Brett Favre, has fond memories of another singular moment in Lambeau Field. It was there he led the Packers to the 30-13 victory over Carolina in the 1996 NFC Championship Game, with the thermometer reading a brisk 3 degrees and the wind chill descending to 17 below.
Two weeks later, Favre escorted the Packers to their first Super Bowl victory in 29 years, a 35-21 conquest of the New England Patriots in the Louisiana Superdome in New Orleans.
Fast forwarding to the present, today's game program celebrates Lambeau Field's arrival at the half-century mark.
Original stadium dedication ceremonies, conducted on Sept. 29, 1957, were graced by Vice President Richard M. Nixon, NFL Commissioner Bert Bell and the reigning "Miss America," Marilyn VanDerbur.
Poetically, the Packers christened their new home in appropriate fashion. Quarterback Vito "Babe" Parilli came off the bench in the fourth quarter to settle the issue, firing a touchdown pass to end Gary Knafelc to pull out a 21-17, come-from-behind victory.
It was a festive weekend for Green Bay, which highlighted the occasion with a "Venetian Nights" parade of boats on the Fox River the night before the opening game against the Bears, their most cordially detested rivals.
It is doubtful if any of those celebrants could have envisioned today's Lambeau Field - with a six-story Atrium, a 25,000 square-foot Packers Hall of Fame and an imposing capacity of 72,928 (compared to an original 32,250).
Transformed into a year-around tourist destination with a $295 million renovation of the stadium in the first three years of the new century, "Lambeau" appears ready for the next 50 years.