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The Cardinals, founded in 1898 and a charter member of the National Football League, hold the distinction of being the oldest continuously run professional football franchise in the nation.
The team boasts a colorful history! Its fans have known the club as the Arizona Cardinals, Phoenix Cardinals, St. Louis Cardinals, Chicago Cardinals, Racine Cardinals, the Normals, and the Morgan Athletic Club.
The team began as a neighborhood group that gathered to play football in a predominantly Irish area of Chicago's South Side, playing under the name Morgan Athletic Club. The team later was acquired by Chris O'Brien, a painting and decorating contractor, and soon its playing site changed to nearby Normal Field, prompting the new name Normals.
In 1901, the team gained longstanding identification when O'Brien, finding a bargain, bought used jerseys from the nearby University of Chicago. The jerseys were faded maroon in color, prompting O'Brien to declare, "That's not maroon, it's Cardinal red!" The club's permanent nickname had been born!
In Chicago at the time, football competition was exclusively amateur, but such opposition became increasingly hard to find, so in 1906, the team disbanded. In 1913, O'Brien reorganized the Cardinals. By 1917 they were able to buy new uniforms and hire a coach, Marshall Smith. That year they lost only two games and were champions of the Chicago Football League.
The war in Europe and a flu epidemic in the United States forced the team to suspend operations once again in 1918. Following Armistice Day, O'Brien organized the Cardinals for a third time. From that day forward, the Cardinals have been a permanent part of the professional football scene in America.
The Racine Cardinals, their popularity growing in the Chicago area, eventually became one of 11 charter members of the American Professional Football League, forerunner of the NFL, in 1920 for the $100 franchise fee. Immediately after joining the league, O'Brien lured a great halfback, John "Paddy" Driscoll, to the Cardinals for $3,000 a year, a sum considered outlandish at the time. But Driscoll was an authentic superstar, a superior runner, blocker, punter, and possibly the finest drop kicker in the history of football. He also coached the team from 1921–22.
One of Driscoll's young running backs was Ralph Horween, a former star at Harvard, who played under the assumed name of B. McMahon. A Cardinal from 1921–22, Horween scored two rushing touchdowns during his three-year career during the days of leather helmets without face masks, numberless sweater jerseys, and $40 paychecks. Horween's claim to fame, however, would occur many years later. In 1996, the retired lawyer, who was born in Chicago on August 3, 1896, became the National Football League's first centenarian! He died in 1997.
In 1922, a team from Racine, Wisconsin joined the NFL, prompting the Cardinals to change their name to the Chicago Cardinals. The same year the Cardinals also moved into their new home in Comiskey Park that they would share with baseball's White Sox for 37 years.
Under new Head Coach Norman Barry, the Cardinals outdistanced a field of 20 teams to win their first NFL championship in 1925 by virtue of the league's best record.
A Chicago physician, Dr. David Jones, purchased the team in 1929. In his first year of ownership, he coaxed running back Ernie Nevers out of retirement to become player-coach. Still in his prime, the 26-year-old Nevers scored an NFL-record 40 points on six touchdowns and four extra points in an historic 40–6 victory over the crosstown Bears on Thanksgiving Day, 1929.
Charles W. Bidwill Sr., a vice president of the Chicago Bears, purchased the Cardinals for Jones' asking price of $50,000. Bidwill divested himself of his Bears' holdings and a new era began.
However, the team sorely missed Nevers' magic on the field. The Cardinals endured difficult years in the 1930s and early '40s. World War II hit the team heavily. The Cardinals' top passer, receiver, and lineman Johnny Clement, Billy Dewell, and Joe Kuharich, respectively entered the service. In 1944 as a war-time emergency measure, the Cardinals combined with the Pittsburgh Steelers to play as one team. It was called Card-Pitt. Co-coached by the Cardinals' Phil Handler and the Steelers' Walt Kiesling, a former Cardinal guard, the team split its home games between Comiskey Park and Forbes Field in Pittsburgh, failing to win an outing in 10 tries.
Success finally returned following the war. In 1945, the arrival of University of Missouri quarterback Paul Christman trumpeted the team's conversion to the "T" formation. Fullback Pat Harder and halfback Elmer Angsman were added in 1946.
(read more about the Cardinals history here)
The Arizona Years
After 28 years in St. Louis, the Cardinals relocated to Arizona in the spring of 1988 and made Sun Devil Stadium on the campus of Arizona State University their new home.
Their first season in the Valley of the Sun began optimistically when the team raced to a 7–4 record and a share of the NFC Eastern Division lead. But untimely injuries struck and a five-game losing streak ensued to finish the year, dashing hopes of the club's first postseason berth since 1982.
The Cardinals' new home provided club single-game (67,139 vs. Dallas in the Arizona inaugural game) and single-season (472,937) attendance records in the team's first autumn in Arizona.
Four coaching changes and a name change have altered the face of the Cardinals since their Arizona arrival. Following their first two seasons in the desert, long-time Washington assistant Joe Bugel arrived as head coach, a position he held for four seasons until Buddy Ryan was named head coach and general manager on February 3, 1994. Vince Tobin succeeded Ryan as head coach on February 7, 1996. Then on December 18, 2000, Dave McGinnis, the Cardinals' dynamic five-year defensive coordinator, was named the franchises head coach.
On March 17, 1994, Bidwill announced his intention to change the name of the team to the Arizona Cardinals. The change was adopted unanimously by vote of NFL owners the following week.
All the Cardinals' franchise attendance records have been established since moving to the desert. The record-setting inaugural season attendance total was eclipsed in 1994 when 497,330 fans, or 62,166 per game, spun the Sun Devil Stadium turnstiles.
The top 10 single-game home crowds in franchise history have watched the Cardinals in Sun Devil Stadium, including the largest, a throng of 73,025 that saw the Cards face Dallas on September 19, 1993.
The 1995 season also marked another milestone when the Cardinals served as the host team for Super Bowl XXX at Sun Devil Stadium on January 28, 1996.
The 1998 Arizona squad, one of the NFL's youngest teams, ended the franchise's 15-year playoff drought and notched the Cardinals' first postseason victory since 1947.
The 2000 season proved pivotal to the Cardinals' franchise. An October coaching change promoted then-defensive coordinator Dave McGinnis to interim head coach, replacing Vince Tobin after four and one-half seasons. Eight weeks later, McGinnis was named the franchise's permanent head coach.
Election Day, November 7, 2000, fell in between. Voters in Maricopa County passed Proposition 302, the Tourism and Sports Initiative, to help fund a new stadium for the Cardinals, Tostitos Fiesta Bowl, and future Super Bowls, in addition to providing revenue for Cactus League spring training baseball, tourism, and youth recreation. The 454,785 "yes" votes spelled a plurality of 33,123 votes (51.89 percent).
The team's new home is the University of Phoenix Stadium in Glendale, Arizona which opened in 2006.
Hall of Famers
The list of former Cardinals enshrined in the Pro Football Hall of Fame are Charles Bidwill, Guy Chamberlin, Conzelman, Driscoll, Kiesling, Curly Lambeau, Dick "Night Train" Lane, Ollie Matson, Nevers, Jackie Smith, Jim Thorpe, Trippi, and Larry Wilson, who currently serves the Cardinals as a vice president.
Arizona Cardinals
One Cardinals Drive
Glendale, Arizona 85305
Telephone: 480-505-0533
Arizona Cardinals Website
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