James Etheridge

Fifty-five years ago I became a Dallas Cowboys fan. It was the first football game I had ever attended above the level of Pop Warner. The game took place Christmas Eve, 1967 in the Cotton Bowl Stadium. The Cowboys were playing the Cleveland Browns for the Eastern Conference Championship. The winner would play either the Green Bay Packers or the Los Angeles Rams for the NFL Championship. We were in Dallas for Christmas and my uncle Errol, who worked for State Farm, had secured six tickets, two seats each located in three different parts of the stadium. My father and I had two seats, my Uncle Errol and cousin Ronnie had two and my Uncle Allen and cousin Robb had the final two. My father and I were seated on the forty-yard line about twenty rows up from field level, behind the Cowboys’ bench. Dallas won 52-14. After the game, I told my father I was going to play eighth-grade football the next year when I started high school.

The victory put the Cowboys in the NFL Championship Game against the Packers. It would be played in Green Bay the following week on New Years Eve. I still remember watching the game on our new RCA color TV. The game would become an icon in football history, known forever as The Ice Bowl. The Ice Bowl was arguably the greatest game ever played. One thing that is indisputable. It was the coldest game ever played, before or since.

Lambeau Field has long been known in Green Bay lore as “The Frozen Tundra.” It is the definitive home-field advantage. On December 31, 1967, it lived up to its name. Kickoff was at 1 pm. The temperature at that time was sixteen below zero with a wind chill factor around minus forty-eight. The field was beginning to freeze and as the game wore on, it became like a sheet of ice due to the shadow of the stadium. NFL Commissioner Pete Rozelle considered postponing the game until Monday, New Years Day but didn’t because the forecast was for even colder weather. As it turned out, that was not the case.

Vince Lombardi, the Packers’ legendary coach, had an electric heating system installed under the field prior to the season. It malfunctioned overnight before the game and when the tarp was removed Sunday morning, the field was damp and quickly froze. In 1967, sports technology was not advanced enough to prepare for such adverse conditions. Green Bay players wore brown gloves that were little more than gardening gloves, although Lombardi ordered his quarterbacks, running backs receivers and linebackers not to wear them. Some wore them anyway. The Cowboys old-school defensive coordinator Ernie Stautner flatly refused to let any of his players wear them. Footing on the icy field was treacherous, due to the players’ cleats not being able to penetrate the ice. Bob Hayes, the Cowboys’ wide receiver, ran routes with his hands tucked in his pants. Officials could not use whistles because they froze and stuck to their lips. After the game the NFL switched to plastic whistles.

Packer fans have always been among, if not the most, dedicated fans in the history of the NFL. Each home game is a sellout. It has been so for years and will continue to as such well into the future. And on that frigid day, the last day of 1967, 50,861 brave and hardy souls packed Lambeau Field to witness what would become a game for the ages.

Dallas and Green Bay were the two best teams in the NFL and the game was a re-match of the 1966 Championship Game, which Green Bay won 34-27. Given the conditions, it’s a wonder they could play football at all, no matter how good the teams were. But they played and the game was a testament to the talent, resiliency and intestinal fortitude of all of the men on both sides of the ball.

Green Bay jumped out to a fourteen-point lead in the second quarter. Dallas scored on a seven-yard fumble return and added a field goal before the half. There was no scoring in the third quarter and on the first play of the fourth, Dallas halfback Dan Reeves hit flanker Lance Rentzel with a pass for a 50 yard TD. Green Bay began their final drive on their own 32-yard line and drove to the Dallas one. Green Bay ran two unsuccessful running plays before quarterback Bart Starr carried the ball in behind the blocks of Jerry Kramer and Ken Bowman for the winning touchdown with thirteen seconds left on the clock.

Green Bay had set a record that still stands today. They are the only team in the history of the NFL to win three consecutive championship titles. They would play two weeks later under much more favorable conditions at the Orange Bowl in Miami, defeating the Oakland Raiders 33-14 in Super Bowl II. Vince Lombardi retired after the game, signaling the end of a dynasty.

The aftermath of the Ice Bowl was long lasting and, in some cases, devastating. An elderly spectator in the stands died from hypothermia. Players suffered frostbite on their feet and toes. Dallas defensive tackle Bob Lilly’s lungs were permanently damaged due to the freeze. Cowboys coach Tom Landry’s wife Alicia missed the decisive play because her eyelashes were frozen shut.

Sadly, CBS, who televised the game, has no recording of the game. Back then, it was standard procedure to re-use tape. The only extended video is property of NFL Films, who were at the game filming the highlights. So, the Ice Bowl might very well have fallen prey to As The World Turns.

About a week after The Ice Bowl, a package arrived addressed to me from my Uncle Errol in Dallas. It was a replica jersey of my favorite Cowboy Dan Reeves, a Georgia boy who wore #30. Against my father’s wishes, I wore the jersey every time I played backyard ball until I finally outgrew it and it was literally falling apart. I kept it a number of years afterward until it finally disappeared, most probably the victim of one of my mother’s spring-cleaning binges.

I’ve always caught a lot of grief living in Atlanta my whole life and being a Cowboys fan. But when I was a kid growing up, Dallas was winning championships and the Falcons were, well, the Falcons. They still are and probably will be always. I personally believe that franchise is cursed. The funny thing is, I have always been a fan of the Cowboys’ rival teams. I was a fan of the Packers as a kid. I still am. During the Seventies I always pulled for the Steelers unless they were playing the Cowboys. Dallas, Green Bay and Pittsburgh always have been and always will be my three favorite teams. They are storied franchises and I suppose it comes down to wanting to see them play for all the marbles one more time.

I stuck to my word and went out for eighth-grade football. By some miracle I made the traveling team and played all through high school, five straight seasons. I loved football. I watched it. I studied it. I lived it and I breathed it. Jerry Kramer, the offensive guard who threw the key block on Starr’s scoring dive, wrote a book called Instant Replay, which was published in 1968. It is a diary of the 1967 Championship season, beginning in training camp and culminating in The Ice Bowl and Super Bowl II. It is candid and insightful account of a bygone era of pro football and for a thirteen year-old playing his first year of high school football, it was required reading!

I was fortunate to play in some great games. As a Georgia Bulldog season-ticket holder, I saw a lot of great games. But by far, the greatest game I was ever a first-hand witness to was the first one I attended; The Cowboys vs. The Browns, Cotton Bowl Stadium, Christmas Eve, 1967 and the 52-14 victory that put Dallas in The Ice Bowl. That is something that puts an indelible stamp on a twelve-year old boy’s brain. The Memories Are There. They Always Will Be.