Has an NFL exhibition game ever been played at HPSS? Might be a way to introduce NJ football fans who have never been to Rutgers to the stadium and tailgate facilities. I've met many. And maybe put a few bucks in the coffers of the athletics department or a local charity. We could consider this game as sort of a reverse Rutgers playing at Yankees Stadium.
Has an NFL exhibition game been played at HPSS?
- Thread starter Mr_Twister
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Side note, anybody remember when we hosted an NBA exhibition game at the RAC? And no I'm not referring to when the Nets actually played reg. season games there. This was 2 decades later... prob. '95 or '96. If my memory serves me right it was the Suns vs. the Nets. Thought it was pretty cool. Wonder if it was due to a conflict with the Devils.
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I saw Willie Joe play in a game against someone many years ago at the original Rutgers Stadium. Watched him ,from 20 ft away,throwing warmups on the sideline. You could almost hear the ball humming.ZING.
The Giants and Eagles used to play preseason game at Princeton every year. Last game in 1974. Palmer Stadium held a lot more back then and there were a lot more preseason games.
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Oh, come on Tango. Surely you remember when the Giants & Eagles played a yearly pre-season game at Palmer Stadium. So that suggestion
is not crazy. Sure better than playing a football game in a baseball stadium.
Football hall of fame in the background...
I actually think it is a great idea, but no way to make it happen. No reason for a pro team to play in a smaller stadium.
I actually think it is a great idea, but no way to make it happen. No reason for a pro team to play in a smaller stadium.
That was a different age. No NFL team is going to give up the preseason money they'd lose playing at HPSS. I also believe they do not have to share proceeds with the NFLPA so we're talking about a huge chunk of change.
Me too... I was 5 years old and not at all interested in football. It was 3 years before he took me to another game because he spent most of his time in the refreshment lines! (Some things never change!)
Jets used to practice near my house. I would ride my bike to the field and watch. I didn't go as much as I should have though. Years later I played HS ball on same field. Talk about ghosts...
Rutgers 1931 alumnus and former Targum staffer David A. “Sonny” Werblin took over the New York Jets and had them play exhibition games against the Boston Patriots in 1963 and 1964 at Rutgers Stadium. The 1965 exhibition game between the Jets and Buffalo Bills raised money for the Football Hall of Fame Building Fund. In the second half of the August 31, 1965 game, the Jets started their rookie quarterback - Joe Namath.
Beat me to it.. of course Werblin had something to do with this. Why couldn't that guy have lived forever?
And Source.. you have been the MVP of this board FOREVER. Dirtyru creates some nice content too.. but damn, man, you always "bring it".
Actually, the first appearance of the National Football League at Rutgers Stadium occurred for charity fund raising exhibitions during WWII.
The NFL would come to Rutgers Stadium for the first time in September of 1942. An All-Star team was put together by future College Football HOF and NYU star Ken Strong to face owner Dan Topping’s NFL Brookyn Dodgers. Proceeds went to the New Brunswick Negro Soldier Service Center. The game drew 8,000. The Dodgers were an NFL team from 1930-43 with Topping as a co-owner from 1934-45. He then became owner of baseball’s New York Yankees from 1945-64 and team president until 1966. He was also an honored Rutgers guest at the November 5, 1938 Dedication Game of the Stadium.
The following year the same match-up occurred with Rutgers QB Art Gottlieb '40, hero of the 1938 Rutgers Stadium Dedication Game where Rutgers finally defeated Princeton a second time. Proceeds went to the American Legion’s Joyce Kilmer Post.
The NFL would come to Rutgers Stadium for the first time in September of 1942. An All-Star team was put together by future College Football HOF and NYU star Ken Strong to face owner Dan Topping’s NFL Brookyn Dodgers. Proceeds went to the New Brunswick Negro Soldier Service Center. The game drew 8,000. The Dodgers were an NFL team from 1930-43 with Topping as a co-owner from 1934-45. He then became owner of baseball’s New York Yankees from 1945-64 and team president until 1966. He was also an honored Rutgers guest at the November 5, 1938 Dedication Game of the Stadium.
The following year the same match-up occurred with Rutgers QB Art Gottlieb '40, hero of the 1938 Rutgers Stadium Dedication Game where Rutgers finally defeated Princeton a second time. Proceeds went to the American Legion’s Joyce Kilmer Post.
Hey Source... you know how that colonial tavern stuff was found while building teh south endzone expansion.. rising sun tavern or something.
Anyway.. when they were building the WPA project Rutgers Stadium.. the whole thing... any chance you have a source on them finding stuff like that then?
Anyway.. when they were building the WPA project Rutgers Stadium.. the whole thing... any chance you have a source on them finding stuff like that then?
Nothing mentioned in the building of the original Rutgers Stadium from 1936-38. Does this answer your question?
Who could have imagined there was drinking at Rutgers Stadium before there was a Stadium… or even a Rutgers? The July 2, 2008 Newsday carried a story that when Rutgers excavated the dirt at the southern end of the football field to make way for more seating, crews unearthed a port community from the 1700s including the possible remains of the Rising Sun Tavern, “Thousands of artifacts include wine bottles, cutlery and ceramics from the Raritan Landing settlement. There are even clam shells on a bed of ash that may have been part of a clam bake… Rutgers says that section will be transformed into a plaza and will have a historical marker…” An historical account of the area in the April 15, 1875 Daily Fredonian of New Brunswick mentioned, “A few yards above Hunt’s, on the opposite side of the old Road where Jacob Christopher now lives, in 1766 was Cornelia Waldron’s Tavern. The place was afterwards owned and occupied for a time by Daniel Brunson… and removed about a half mile down the road, where he kept the ‘Rising Sun,’ or what was for a long time called the “Brunson Tavern,’ now the Demott House. In his new occupation he did a large and profitable business in the great staging and carting times… Success in tavern keeping did not at that time depend so much on the sale of strong liquors as at the present day… Daniel Brunson’s wife’s name was Sarah Whitlock. She was a member of the Reformed Church of New Brunswick.”
Who could have imagined there was drinking at Rutgers Stadium before there was a Stadium… or even a Rutgers? The July 2, 2008 Newsday carried a story that when Rutgers excavated the dirt at the southern end of the football field to make way for more seating, crews unearthed a port community from the 1700s including the possible remains of the Rising Sun Tavern, “Thousands of artifacts include wine bottles, cutlery and ceramics from the Raritan Landing settlement. There are even clam shells on a bed of ash that may have been part of a clam bake… Rutgers says that section will be transformed into a plaza and will have a historical marker…” An historical account of the area in the April 15, 1875 Daily Fredonian of New Brunswick mentioned, “A few yards above Hunt’s, on the opposite side of the old Road where Jacob Christopher now lives, in 1766 was Cornelia Waldron’s Tavern. The place was afterwards owned and occupied for a time by Daniel Brunson… and removed about a half mile down the road, where he kept the ‘Rising Sun,’ or what was for a long time called the “Brunson Tavern,’ now the Demott House. In his new occupation he did a large and profitable business in the great staging and carting times… Success in tavern keeping did not at that time depend so much on the sale of strong liquors as at the present day… Daniel Brunson’s wife’s name was Sarah Whitlock. She was a member of the Reformed Church of New Brunswick.”
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The College Football Hall of Fame was going to be located in Piscataway. That all went out the window when Harvey Harman died in 1969. I could write a book on the subject. Well, at least a large pamphlet...
http://www.footballfoundation.org/Programs/CollegeFootballHallofFame/SearchDetail.aspx?id=30036
How many of you remember when the pro soccer team, the New Jersey Americans of the American Soccer League,played their games at Rutgers Stadium ?--By the way, the womens pro team that currently plays at Rutgers is the only team in the NWSL that does not use a geographic name--it is just Sky Blue. Would it kill them to use the correct name, New Jersey Sky Blue. Are there any other pro sports teams in America that don't say where they play or at least lie about it--New Jersey Giants,New Jersey Jets,Orchard Park Bills,Arlington Cowboys,etc. ?
