Trans America Football League(s)

[Mark L. Ford]

At the suggestion of my good friend, oldecapecod, I'm posting a separate thread on the TAFL, one of three proposed post-war competitors to the NFL that was announced in 1944. There was another TAFL, though I'll have to look in Bob Gill's book to see whether that was in 1970 or 1971.

Re: TAFL
Postby Mark L. Ford » Wed Oct 22, 2014 10:21 am

I remember this topic from a few months back-- I had been researching recently on another TAFL, the Trans-America Football League which was one of three proposed post-war NFL competitors discussed in 1944 and 1945. Arch Ward's AAFC won that battle, beating out Chick Meehan's TAFL and Roland Payne's USFL, but Meehan almost got the edge when he had a verbal agreement that his New York team could use Yankee Stadium. The baseball Yankees were sold, though, to a group that included NFL owner Dan Topping, who then moved his Brooklyn Tigers assets to the AAFC to create his New York Yankees football team.

There was also a minor football league in Texas that briefly took on the name Trans-America Football League and that experimented with playing its season in the spring. Neither of these have anything to do with Turkey, of course, but they were TAFL.
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Re: TAFL
Postby oldecapecod 11 » Wed Oct 22, 2014 10:45 am

When I started to comprise a list (last evening,) I saw another TAFL? I did not look because it was not the focus of the exercise.
Later, I will. If it references other than turkeys, I will post it asap. If a duplication - delete it, of course, and one less to do.
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Re: TAFL
Postby oldecapecod 11 » Wed Oct 22, 2014 10:53 am

It was this same Thread. The confusion arose because (as can be seen) a second thread was started?
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Re: TAFL
Postby Mark L. Ford » Wed Oct 22, 2014 12:26 pm

It was just a casual observation on my part. I had recently been reading more details about the 1944 TAFL proposal. If it had made it to the gridiron in 1946, Meehan had already stated his plans to purchase the naming rights from an existing minor league, located on the West Coast. Had that happened, there would have been an eight-team, coast to coast "American Football League" in 1946 rather than 1960. The west coast league folded after one season, and an eastern states minor league then took over the AFL name until going out of business in 1950.
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Re: TAFL
Postby oldecapecod 11 » Wed Oct 22, 2014 12:59 pm

I do not have any input to the operation of this tool.
If I did, I would say that deserves a Thread of its own.
Many more people might be interested in those details that have shown interest in the goings-on in Turkey.

Anything "Trans" seems to attract attention now-a-days and Trans-American would enter this forum virgin pure - unless, of course, it is tucked away in the body of a Thread with different orientation.

As for Trans-Americans in Texas...
for some reason I don't picture cowpunchers and roughnecks as being fans of much that is "trans-?"
Although, if Wisconsin could have the Belles, Chicks, Does, Fairies, Pinks, and Snappers, I guess anything should not be surprising?

[oldecapecod11]

That's a tease.

It is not hard to understand why any group or two or three or four or more would fall before the legions of Arch Ward's friends and contacts. The Chicago Tribune was a tad better read than any newspaper not in New York or Washington, DC or London.
It would be interesting to see a timeline of Ward's accomplishments and where the offers to serve as NFL Commissioner are set in the order?
I guess the Littlewood biography will be on my request list when I next visit my local Library. (Wonderful places those!)

Anyway, why a tease?

Well, I think that information would be far more interesting if it included the towns and teams proposed as members of the leagues not formed and the potential owners and venues as well. Sometimes that data reveals precisely why the "winning" venture got off the ground.
I can find the some information about a Texas League in the late '60s and 1970 and a Trans-America League of 1971 - but nothing in competition with the founding of the A-AFC.
Help!

Here's what little I have...

Texas Football League
Minor Professional League
1966-68 / 1970 / (1971)
Teams
Bartlesville (Oklahoma) QuicKicks 1970
Beaumont (Texas) Golden Vikings 1968
Dallas (Texas) Rockets 1966-68 & 1970
El Paso (Texas) Jets 1968
Fort Worth (Texas) Braves 1968 & 1970
Fort Worth (Texas) Texans 1967
Odessa-Midland (Texas) Comets 1966-68
Omaha (Nebraska) Mustangs 1970
Pasadena (Texas) Pistols 1966-67
San Antonio (Texas) Toros 1967-68 & 1970
Sherman-Denison (Texas) Jets 1966-67
Texarkana (Texas) Titans 1968 & 1970
Tulsa (Oklahoma) Oilers ##### 1966 *****
Tulsa (Oklahoma) Thunderbirds 1967-68
West Texas Rufnecks 1968
(Midland, TX & Odessa, TX)
Wichita Falls (Texas) Kings 1966-67
1966 Texas Football League Founded w George Schepps of Dallas, Texas as Commissioner
1969 Texas Football League Merged w Continental Football League - BUT as Texas Division w 2-division alignment
1970 Continental Football League Folded after naming George Scwepps Commissioner
Scwepps rallied TFL franchises & Texas Football League Resumed Play
1970 George Scwepps resigned as Commissioner following Championship Game
TFL was ready to fold - BUT 3-man Executive Committee
Jimmy Cobb of Texarkana, Texas; Henry Hight of San Antonio, Texas; & Joe Verret of Dallas, Texas
organized & formed
1971 Trans-American Football League
w 3 Divisions: Central, Eastern & Western but only Central Division (Texas)
to operate in 1st season
remaining 2 divisions never materialized
League moved to Spring schedule - and Flopped
Trans-American Football League
Minor Professional League
1971 Teams
Texarkana (Texas) Titans 1971
San Antonio (Texas) Toros 1971
Fort Worth (Texas) Braves 1971
Dallas (Texas) Rockets 1971
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
***** Tulsa (Oklahoma) Oilers ##### 1966
(I like to enumerate teams that have shared a name by their chronological existence.
There have probably been about 10-15 Oilers in Tulsa and I just have not got to it yet.
Flog me!

[oldecapecod11]

HA! I see this is currently on the same page as the Chicago Tribune Archives Thread.
Divine Coincidence, no doubt!
Someone familiar navigating that site can surely come up with a few articles listing all the data about the proposed leagues.

[oldecapecod11]

Whoops! For those interested, I do have some additional data re the Texas league; I.E. Championships, alignments by year and a few other things but too much to burden this thread.
If you want the rest, I can send it to you personally.
What I do not have and would like are the venues. If anyone knows, please share.

[Mark L. Ford]

Interestingly enough, besides his connections to the Texas Football League, George Schepps also held the prospective Dallas franchise in the 1944 TAFL. At the time, he owned the Dallas Rebels minor league team in baseball's Texas League. As with the other investors (Chick Meehan had sold franchises to people in Baltimore, Los Angeles, Philadelphia, Brooklyn and New York as well, with applicants from Houston and Denver), Schepps was given back his deposit when Meehan called it quits on June 5, 1945.

[oldecapecod11]

George Schepps

What a guy...

Here I've had him in my files for years waiting for time or inclination to do more work on the Texas Football League and the Trans-American Football League and never suspected the guy was a positive legend.
Not only did he keep a couple of football leagues going but he was one of the best things to happen to Texas baseball prior to Nelson Wolff.

Sometimes it's scary when one man does so much and so many men do so little...

SCHEPPS ERA USHERS LONG minor-league reign in Corpus Christi
Athletic entrepreneur George Schepps hit town in the late 1940s. With him came the longest run to date of a minor-league franchise in the city.

http://www.caller.com/sports/whole-new-ballgame
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schepps_Palm_Field
http://www.caller.com/sports/whole-new-ballgame

Somewhere, he's even got something great to say about Kyle Rote.

In the months before Rote reported to the Giants training camp in 1951 and began earning the reported $20,000 salary that a #1 draft pick commanded in those days, the San Antonio native tooks a few swings in minor league baseball. He signed with the Corpus Christi Aces of the Class B Gulf Coast League. He was given uniform #44, the number he wore at SMU.

He proved to be more than just a box office attraction, though. His hitting earned him a promotion from a pinch-hitter to a starting outfielder. He played in only 22 games, but in 66 at-bats had seven home runs, including three in one game on April 26. Team owner George Schepps said one of those homers was the longest ever hit in the Corpus Christi ballpark. Rote hit .348 with a .712 slugging average. The Aces went on to win the GCL pennant by 12 games, but by then Rote was long gone to the NFL.

[rhickok1109]

George Schepps

What a guy...

Here I've had him in my files for years waiting for time or inclination to do more work on the Texas Football League and the Trans-American Football League and never suspected the guy was a positive legend.
Not only did he keep a couple of football leagues going but he was one of the best things to happen to Texas baseball prior to Nelson Wolff.

Sometimes it's scary when one man does so much and so many men do so little...

SCHEPPS ERA USHERS LONG minor-league reign in Corpus Christi
Athletic entrepreneur George Schepps hit town in the late 1940s. With him came the longest run to date of a minor-league franchise in the city.

http://www.caller.com/sports/whole-new-ballgame
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schepps_Palm_Field
http://www.caller.com/sports/whole-new-ballgame

Somewhere, he's even got something great to say about Kyle Rote.

In the months before Rote reported to the Giants training camp in 1951 and began earning the reported $20,000 salary that a #1 draft pick commanded in those days, the San Antonio native tooks a few swings in minor league baseball. He signed with the Corpus Christi Aces of the Class B Gulf Coast League. He was given uniform #44, the number he wore at SMU.

He proved to be more than just a box office attraction, though. His hitting earned him a promotion from a pinch-hitter to a starting outfielder. He played in only 22 games, but in 66 at-bats had seven home runs, including three in one game on April 26. Team owner George Schepps said one of those homers was the longest ever hit in the Corpus Christi ballpark. Rote hit .348 with a .712 slugging average. The Aces went on to win the GCL pennant by 12 games, but by then Rote was long gone to the NFL.

Of course, Rote also wore #44 in the NFL.