The first big game was almost lost to history.
On January 15, 1967, the showdown between the NFL and AFL, later known as Super Bowl I, began at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum. The Green Bay Packers, led by coach Vince Lombardi and MVP quarterback Bart Starr, dominated the Kansas City Chiefs 35-10 in a lopsided game that was broadcast on both NBC and CBS. More than 50 million Americans watched it.
Sadly, neither NBC nor CBS kept the master tape of the broadcast, and this game was doomed never to be played again.
“In the late '60s, the networks didn't really save sports,” Ron Simon, a curator at the Paley Center for Media in New York, told the Post.
Fortunately, the Midtown Manhattan-based nonprofit organization was gifted the only known recording of Super Bowl I from an unexpected source.it is It will be shown for the first time on February 10th. It will be held as part of the “Beyond the Big Game” exhibition, which will run until March 3rd. Created in partnership with the NFL and the Pro Football Hall of Fame, the showcase features more than 150 iconic photos, carefully selected memorabilia and a treasure trove of viral commercials. From about 60 years of playing.
But the broadcast of the first Super Bowl is particularly special.
“This is truly the first public screening of the Super Bowl,” Simon said of the upcoming event, characterizing the footage as the “holy grail” of sports broadcasting.
It was caught by pure chance. In 1967, Martin Haupt was an engineer at Pennsylvania State, but he was not involved in broadcasting the game. However, this technician repaired and maintained television equipment, and he had the tools and expertise to record the games on 2-inch tape.
In the late 1960s, recording television programs and live events was “very difficult” for the average viewer, Simon said. “It took a lot of expertise. We were very fortunate that the Scranton engineer who was responsible for the 2-inch tape decided to make a copy of it.”
This wonderful recording by Haupt, who died in 1977, sat for decades in the attic of his family's home in Shamokin, Pennsylvania. In 2016, Haupt's son Troy… announced He inherited the footage and donated the tapes to the museum.
It is unclear why Haupt recorded the broadcast.
“We don't know much about him,” Simon said. “His son left these tapes in his will, they were an inheritance and they were kept in the attic. [Troy] I don't know what the person who actually saved these tapes was thinking when they recorded them because I didn't know his father very well. ”
The Paley Museum has meticulously restored and digitized the original footage.
“Our mission was to make it as close as possible to the way it was seen and heard by millions of people in 1967,” says Simon. “The tapes had been stored in the attic for many years, so obviously there were some technical challenges.”
The two-hour video doesn't capture the entire game, but lucky viewers will get to see gridiron greats like Packers coach Vince Lombardi and league commissioner Pete Rozelle.
“Haupt wanted to keep the match as long as possible,” Simon said. “He scored for most of the first half and had some stops to start, but was missing halftime and part of the third quarter. But he had a final celebration in the locker room. .'' Includes many commercials for cigarettes and beer.
“It gives you a good idea of what 1967 was like. “It gives you a good idea of what that game was like,'' Simon said of the footage. “Anyone interested in the early preservation of television sports will want to see this.”
