A little history of the Bengals founder.

[BengalszoneBilly]

Paul Brown was born in Norwalk Ohio, September 7,1909. He attended Massillion HS. After graduating he enrolled at Ohio State earning a Master of Arts degree in education, he later enrolled at Miami University in Oxford Ohio, where he holds a bachelor of arts degree. He played football for Miami as a fine passer and runner. After graduating he coach at Severn Prep School in Maryland for 2 years. He left there to coach basket ball and football for his hometown high school team Massillion High for 7 years. He earned several state titles and establish Massillion as one of the premier football programs in the nation.

One season leading he team a full year without a punt. When the Ohio State coaching position open up, many of his opponent in the Ohio High School Coaches Association lobbied for him to received the position. He coach Ohio State From 1941 to 1943 going 6-1-1 his first year, and then leading the team to a national title in 1942 going 9-1, their only lost came to Wisconsin when a dozen of his player became sick during the trip. The following year the team went 3-6. He join the service and lead the Great Lakes Navy team to 2 successful seasons.

After WWII ended the All-American Football Conference was formed. Mickey McBride owner of the Cleveland team hired Brown as coach offering $20,000 a season plus 15% of the teams profit while having the team named after him. Brown lead his team to 4 championships in the four season the league survived. Brown's team won 47 lost 4 and tied 3 from 1946 to 1949 going 14-0 in 1948.

In 1950 the Browns enter the NFL with 3 other teams from the AAFC. The Browns first game was against NFL champion Philadelphia Eagles. The game matching the two champions from the two different leagues. the Eagles were heavy favorites 70,000 fans crammed into Municipal Stadium to watch the contest. The Browns won the game 35-10. After Greasy Neale the Eagles head coach commented sure they can defeat us with that fancy passing stuff but how could they do in a physical game, later that year they played again and the Brown's never recorded a pass and again defeated the Eagles 13-7 after that year Neale retired.

The league used two basic defenses in 1950 the 5-2-4 and the 5-3-3 each of these defenses were vulnerable to the side line pass. Because of his success Brown cause the development of the umbrella defense or 4-3 develop by Steve Owens. When the Browns played the the NY Giants that season, but could not defeat them because of the new defense. They ended tied for conference championship but the Browns won 8-3 in the playoff, and moved on to defeat the LA Rams 30-28 in one of the best games ever played. That season the Brown's recorded two of the highest point games in history against Baltimore and Detroit 70-27 and 65-24.

The Paul Brown team went on to lead his team to 6 division crowns in 6 years and two more league championships in 1954 and 1955. Brown was the greatest innovator in NFL history. Brown is credited with instituting press box coaches, play books, showing film to all his players, detail scouting reports, intelligence and psychological testing, first to scout black players, time players in the 40 yard dash because he figure 40 yards was the distance you had to run to cover a kickoff, for calling plays from the side lines, he would use guards because hand signals could be stolen, but the guards got to become to big so hand signal were developed, Brown tried using radio transmitters in the helmet in 1956 but it only lasted a year because a coach with a citizen band radio could easily learn what play was called next, even though large cage face mask were used in the early thirties, they weren't practical for receivers and backs because they block vision. Brown had Graham wear a single bar mask in 1955, after the lone holdout Bobby Lane retire in 1962, every one in the NFL was wearing them.

The draw play was developed by Brown in 1946 for Marion Motley who along with Bill Willis became the First African Americans on a professional team. Motley gain and average 8.2 yds a carry in 1946 and for his AAFC-NFL career averaged 5.7 yds a carry. Since the NFL didn't carry the AAFC stats over another Paul Brown player holds the record with a 5.2 average (Jim Brown). With the Cleveland Browns, Paul Brown only had one losing season 5-7 in 1956.

In 1963 Art Modell bought the Browns and knew that the team would never truly be his as long as Brown remained so he fired the legendary Paul Brown. Paul Brown was inducted into the Hall of Fame in 1967. Paul, not wanting to be in the situation of being fired for success, tried finding partners for a team of his own. Along with his son Mike, who conducted detail surveys showing the potential of a professional team coming to Cincinnati. They arranged with the state of Ohio and the City of Cincinnati, to created the Bengals. There were all kinds of polls to find the right name for the team, but Paul thought that it would be fitting that an old AFL team from the city in the 30's be honor. So the name Bengals was established.

In 1968 the Bengals were formed and Paul led the Bengals to the playoffs in three short years. Before Paul Brown retired from coaching, the Bengals won two division titles and played in three playoffs. His final year he lead the Bengals to a 11-3 record, even though he retired from coaching as a general manager and owner he led them to 4 more playoffs and two Super Bowls. On August 5,1991 in Cincinnati, the country lost one of the best football minds ever.

[Kirkendall]

Billy, thanks for the info. I'm sure it helps new fans understand the founding father of our favorite NFL team.

[BengalszoneBilly]

You're welcome. There were alot of things in that article that I didn't know, or had forgotten!