December 7, 2022

81 Years

There are those who said many years ago that football should not be played on Sunday, a day of rest.

But for most of us football fans, we can barely imagine a world without NFL Sundays in the fall and stretching into the winter.

On Sunday, December 7, 1941, three NFL games were played. The Chicago Bears topped the Chicago Cardinals, 34-24 at Comiskey Park on the South Side, the Brooklyn Dodgers (yes, that was a football team, too) topped the New York Giants, 21-7 at the Polo Grounds, and the Washington Redskins defeated the Philadelphia Eagles, 20-14 at Washington’s Griffith Stadium.

Announcements were made at the stadiums, telling people about the attack on Pearl Harbor. 2,403 American women, men, and children were killed.

The next day, the U.S. officially entered World War II.

That Christmas was different. Ever since, Sundays have always been different.

Comiskey Park is gone, the Polo Grounds are gone, Griffith Stadium is gone.  Football is still here.

Christmas has bubble lights on the trees of 1941, 1942, 2007, and the year 100,000.

A Sunday in December. Football on the field, Christmas in the air, and a terrifying world awakening. --TK