Texana Thursday: Lamar Hunt, NFL Owner and Pioneer

Want to own a pro football team but your bid falls short? Start your own pro football league! That’s what Dallas businessman Lamar Hunt did.

In the late 1950s, Hunt, along with Houston businessman K.S. “Bud” Adams Jr., had each attempted to purchase the then-Chicago Cardinals of the NFL. (The Cardinals eventually moved to Arizona, where they are today known as the Arizona Cardinals.) Both bids failed.

Hunt would recall that if Adams and others wanted to own a team, but failed to get one, perhaps these people might be interested in owning franchises in a new league.

Hunt and Adams met and agreed to start what became the American Football League, or the AFL. The original eight teams were in Buffalo, Boston, Dallas, Denver, Houston, Los Angeles, New York, and Oakland. Play began in 1960. The original owners became known as “The Foolish Club” because of doubts that the league would be successful, particularly as it was competing with the more established NFL. Yet the AFL became a success. Teams in Miami (1966) and Cincinnati (1968) followed.

Hunt’s Texans won the 1962 AFL championship, and relocated to Missouri to become the Kansas City Chiefs, in part because Hunt realized that the Dallas-Fort Worth market couldn’t support both his club and the NFL counterpart Dallas Cowboys.

NFL Commissioner Pete Rozelle, left, with Kansas City Chiefs owner Lamar Hunt in an undated photo (Kansas City Chiefs photo)

Hunt entered into negotiations with the NFL to merge the two leagues, which occured for the 1970 season. As part of the merger agreement, an “AFL-NFL Championship Game” would be staged following the 1966 season. The Chiefs appeared in that game—later known as the Super Bowl—but lost to the NFL’s Green Bay Packers. The Chiefs returned to the Super Bowl in 1970, where they defeated the Minnesota Vikings.

Hunt is credited for giving the Super Bowl its name. He had given his children a toy called a Super Ball, which inspired the name. Hunt believed the name could be improved, but as sports fans know, the name was never changed.

Statue of Lamar Hunt outside of Arrowhead Stadium (Kansas City Chiefs photo)

Hunt died in 2006. His family, led by his son Clark, continue to own and operate the Chiefs franchise.