Big League City! 100 Years of Football in Jacksonville
(http://photos.metrojacksonville.com/photos/3400040047_mMGRQgb-M.jpg)
Big League City! 100 Years of Football in Jacksonville, the new book by Metro Jacksonville member Ken Bowen, chronicles Jacksonville’s unmatched gridiron fervor, from Florida’s first college football game held in the wake of the Great Fire of 1901, to the birth of the Florida-Georgia game and the Gator Bowl Classic, to the numerous professional teams from long-forgotten leagues that have called Jacksonville home, through the new era of Jaguars football currently underway. Years in the making with research drawn from thousands of sources and featuring an exclusive foreword written by Jaguars owner Shad Khan, Big League City! is the most in-depth book ever written on Jacksonville’s football history.
Read More: http://www.metrojacksonville.com/article/2014-jul-big-league-city-100-years-of-football-in-jacksonville
I'll will have to check this book out. Jacksonville unquestionably has a bizarre football history. I still have the exact Sharks pennant shown in the article, along with the one from the Express (the team that replaced the sharks in '75). I think I kept them for novelty since the both teams only last a year each.
Damn man! I was quite the fan in the days of the WFL (Sharks and Express) and USFL leagues, attending games from Orlando to Portland (where we predictably got stomped in what turned out to be the last game ever played in the WFL. These were the days before the internet, and I kept a scrapbook of virtually every news or magazine clipping, programs or press releases. It was freaking huge. When I finally gave up on the addiction and pretty much on Jacksonville ever becoming 'A Big League City,' around 1982, I gave the whole thing to a neighbor as I moved to Orlando. I do have a lot of fond fan memories of the games and still own a complete set of WFL team coasters for the coffee table. Great to see this book come out, I just wish now that I'd kept all of that cool stuff as it should have been in our historical society... but who knew?
I was privileged to read some of the early drafts of this book while Ken was writing it. This is easily the best work available for one of the most distinctive features of Jacksonville history - our long relationship with the game of football. Plus some nice quotes from my old man. Excellent work by one of the Metro Jacksonville regulars.
I was in the Gator Bowl the night Jacksonville caught Colt Fever and Bob Irsay and Jake Godbold landed on the field in a helicopter.
Quote from: Tacachale on July 21, 2014, 10:50:26 AM
I was privileged to read some of the early drafts of this book while Ken was writing it. This is easily the best work available for one of the most distinctive features of Jacksonville history - our long relationship with the game of football. Plus some nice quotes from my old man. Excellent work by one of the Metro Jacksonville regulars.
I read some drafts also. They are actually still in my inbox and Ive read them several times LOL Great work Ken! Im definately getting the book
I can't wait to read this. I loved the 2004 Publix-sponsored "Jacksonville Football History" book that was done for the 10th anniversary of the Jaguars and the pending Super Bowl, but this sounds much more comprehensive!
Thanks guys, very much appreciated. Really enjoyed putting this book together over the last two and a half years, and I hope you all get a chance to check it out :D
Nice to put a face with the name as well.
Ordered my copy today
just ordered me a copy today!
".. the team was annexed from the league. "
There is no definition of the word "annexed" that makes that sentence grammatically correct.
Also, Kansas City Chiefs, not Kansas City Chief's. You don't make a plural with an apostrophe, or a possessive with one before the s.
Quote from: civil42806 on July 21, 2014, 05:02:11 PM
Ordered my copy today
Quote from: Rynjny on July 21, 2014, 06:05:25 PM
just ordered me a copy today!
Thanks so much guys, much appreciated.
Quote from: Editor99 on July 21, 2014, 09:35:53 PM
".. the team was annexed from the league. "
There is no definition of the word "annexed" that makes that sentence grammatically correct.
Also, Kansas City Chiefs, not Kansas City Chief's. You don't make a plural with an apostrophe, or a possessive with one before the s.
Good catch.
I've ordered a recall on the book.
Touché! x1000
Nothing at all against football. Against millionaires showing up with a sports team and sticking the taxpayers with a fat bill while the millionaire get the profits. Worst, many taxpayers don't seem to mind. Get your priorities straight, folks.
Quote from: Redbaron616 on July 24, 2014, 06:53:42 PM
Nothing at all against football. Against millionaires showing up with a sports team and sticking the taxpayers with a fat bill while the millionaire get the profits.
With all due respect, almost every single thing about this statement is factually inaccurate.
^ Specifically, millionaires do not "show up" with sports teams. Millionaires -- billionaires is probably more accurate these days -- purchase sports teams, either from the owner of an existing franchise, or from the pool of owners via league expansion. For example, Wayne Weaver/Touchdown Jacksonville purchased the Jaguars for $140 million from the NFL.
As far as "sticking the taxpayers with a fat bill while the millionaire gets the profits," that's obviously highly subjective. You could argue either way once things like marketing exposure, tourism, and quality of life enhancement are factored in. To me, the biggest offender is television revenue. The NFL's television rights are worth nearly $30 billion, and the host cities share in none of those proceeds. 28 of 32 NFL stadiums are publicly owned. Without those municipally-owned stadiums providing the necessary stage for said television games, there is no $30 billion in TV revenue. Thus, if a city-owned stadium plays host to a televised game, it seems like common sense that the city should get a cut of the television revenue.
The numbers are complicated and easily manipulated, but personally, I'd think it would be very difficult to argue that the Jaguars haven't been a net gain for the city.
The Super Bowl on the other hand...
Well put, Ken. Framing it as "profit" to be taken from a city is off. It's a quality of life expense, and unlike many others expenses it brings revenue back in.
it's a great read but there are few typo errors.
Quote from: Rynjny on July 31, 2014, 01:54:38 PM
it's a great read but there are few typo errors.
As I told my new friend Editor99, these typos that you speak of are the reason that I've made the difficult decision to buy up all existing copies of the book, bury them in the Nevada desert, relocate to the Pacific Northwest, and live out the rest of my existence in deep, reflective shame.
In all seriousness, I have a full time job in civil engineering, a new baby at home, and a limited budget for the project. At 460 pages and over 100,000 words, a misplaced apostrophe or misspelled word is bound to slip through the cracks. If you are able to overlook these egregious offenses (and better yet, email me a heads up so I can correct in subsequent editions), you'll find the best book ever written on Jacksonville's football history.
You'll find a kick-ass foreword by Shad Khan declaring his commitment to Jacksonville and his desire to bring the city a Super Bowl championship. You'll find a long reflection by ESPN's Woody Paige about his rivalry with Jacksonville, how it began, and what he really thinks of the city. You'll find the weird stories about how Jacksonville and Orlando attempted to win a shared NFL expansion team in the 1970s, how the original Jaguars logo was literally copied out of the Jaguar automobile section of the phonebook, and how Fred Bullard's attempt to take the USFL's Jacksonville Bulls public went down in flames. You'll find histories and memorabilia from flash-in-the-pan teams like the Jacksonville All-Stars, Bears, Robins, Jaguars (all three local teams that have used that name in the last century), Firebirds, etc. You'll find detailed stories about how Jacksonville became a Bowl city, an AFL city, a WFL city, a USFL city, an NFL city, an Arena League city, an LFL city, and eventually a Super Bowl city.
Alongside the football, you'll find some of the most colorful characters Jacksonville has ever seen, including stories of rock stars, gangsters, con men, street gangs, burning hotels, crazy preachers who hate beer, planes crashing into Riverside, race riots, rednecks firing at waterspouts with shotguns, Michael Jackson destroying hotel rooms, city corruption, helicopters, poodles on the football field, exploding barges, children diving in a flooded Gator Bowl, snipers on I-295, green polar bears, staged bank robberies, and a prized punter nearly chopping his foot off with an axe in the Jaguars locker room.
Truly had a
blast writing this book over the last couple of years, exhausting as it was, and if people get even a fraction of that enjoyment reading it, I'll be a pretty happy guy ;)
This is just what happens when you publish yourself or with a small press. You're basically your own editor. Typos may be common, but the other side of the coin is that you can release the book you want, rather than what the publisher wants to publish or thinks may sell. In this case, you get a wonderful new book on a very specialized topic - football in Jacksonville, and with substantially more content than would be likely going the normal publishing route - 460 pages is huge. A few typographical errors are a small price to pay.
Quote from: Tacachale on July 31, 2014, 04:32:21 PM
This is just what happens when you publish yourself or with a small press. You're basically your own editor. Typos may be common, but the other side of the coin is that you can release the book you want, rather than what the publisher wants to publish or thinks may sell. In this case, you get a wonderful new book on a very specialized topic - football in Jacksonville, and with substantially more content than would be likely going the normal publishing route - 460 pages is huge. A few typographical errors are a small price to pay.
Thanks buddy!
And I
sincerely appreciate all of your help on the back end.
You Delaneys are a good bunch :D
After having devoured the book this past weekend, I'm really curious to know more about how the interactions went with Tom Sorensen.
Look at the bright side, Ken. It usually takes a writer some years before they have people actually PAYING them to proofread it for errors. I think you might want to take a page (literally) from Clive Cussler. Read the back page, after-forward, closing, whateverthehellyoucallit in any of his books and you'll get the idea.
Congrats, BTW. I think the task of actually finishing the book, especially by an engineer, is a feat all in itself. ;)
Does San Marco Bookstore carry this?
Enjoyed the book a lot Ken, don't live in jax anymore, but quite a few people here in Mobile were interested in it. Learned a lot never really had the lowdown on the WFL fiasco, and the chapter on minor league football was fascinating. its now proudly a coffee table book
Quote from: Wacca Pilatka on July 31, 2014, 04:57:01 PM
After having devoured the book this past weekend, I'm really curious to know more about how the interactions went with Tom Sorensen.
Thanks so much for picking it up!
Tom was surprisingly cool. Nice guy who seemed to get a genuine, if harmless, kick out of prodding Jacksonville back in the day.
Would have loved to get Mike Bianchi's thoughts on the Charlotte-Jacksonville expansion war (he was leading the charge for the Times-Union at the time), but alas, he was simply TOO COOL to chat...
^ Thanks so much guys, really means a lot to me.
P.S. Hope to have the book in San Marco Bookstore by mid-August!
Very cool. Your mention of the Charlotte-Jacksonville expansion war led me to google that phrase...I forgot how the negotiations fell through in 93 and the Jaguars almost didn't exist:
http://articles.baltimoresun.com/1993-07-23/sports/1993204102_1_jacksonville-investment-group-memphis
I'll check out the book! Very interesting.
Quote from: David on August 01, 2014, 12:01:15 PM
Very cool. Your mention of the Charlotte-Jacksonville expansion war led me to google that phrase...I forgot how the negotiations fell through in 93 and the Jaguars almost didn't exist:
http://articles.baltimoresun.com/1993-07-23/sports/1993204102_1_jacksonville-investment-group-memphis
I'll check out the book! Very interesting.
^ Thanks!
My favorite part of the Charlotte-Jacksonville "war" was when a display of Charlotte was floated into the St. Johns River on a barge and publicly blown up by the city.
Shockingly, many found the action to be in poor taste :D
Hey Ken, is the book available in the local book stores yet? I have some copies to buy, and it just wouldn't feel right buying a book like this through Amazon.
Quote from: Tacachale on September 05, 2014, 04:15:19 PM
Hey Ken, is the book available in the local book stores yet? I have some copies to buy, and it just wouldn't feel right buying a book like this through Amazon.
I purchased one at Chamblins Uptown Wednesday evening.