The Other Minneapolis Pro Football Team

**COJOMAY** · 06-12-2008, 10:54 PM

And there was another NFL pro football team in Minneapolis. I posted about it way back in January...

It was the Minnesota Marines (name based on the land of 10,000 lakes).

There are many obscure small town teams that show up briefly in the records of the NFL for the early 1920s, but one of the least well known is the Minneapolis Marines (APFA 1921, NFL 1922-1924). The Marines, owned by locals Johnny Dunn and Val Ness, had a dismal APFA/NFL W-L-T record entirely consistent with the team's obscurity in the annals of pro football: 1921 1-3-0, 1922 1-3-0, 1923 2-5-2, 1924 0-6-0. But the NFL record of the Marines gives a misleading picture of the team's true standing among the earliest pro football teams, because it was in the pre-APFA/NFL years that the Marines reached their peak as a team.

The Marines were organized way back in 1905, as a team of working class teenagers, most of whom lived close to the Cedar/Washington avenue district of the near south side of Minneapolis, about a mile or so south of the present-day Metrodome.

For more information go to: http://www.footballresearch.com/articles/frpage.cfm?topic=marines

**NordicNed** · 06-12-2008, 11:11 PM

"COJOMAY" wrote:

And there was another NFL pro football team in Minneapolis. I posted about it way back in January...

It was the Minnesota Marines (name based on the land of 10,000 lakes).

There are many obscure small town teams that show up briefly in the records of the NFL for the early 1920s, but one of the least well known is the Minneapolis Marines (APFA 1921, NFL 1922-1924). The Marines, owned by locals Johnny Dunn and Val Ness, had a dismal APFA/NFL W-L-T record entirely consistent with the team's obscurity in the annals of pro football: 1921 1-3-0, 1922 1-3-0, 1923 2-5-2, 1924 0-6-0. But the NFL record of the Marines gives a misleading picture of the team's true standing among the earliest pro football teams, because it was in the pre-APFA/NFL years that the Marines reached their peak as a team.

The Marines were organized way back in 1905, as a team of working class teenagers, most of whom lived close to the Cedar/Washington avenue district of the near south side of Minneapolis, about a mile or so south of the present-day Metrodome.

For more information go to: http://www.footballresearch.com/articles/frpage.cfm?topic=marines

Thanks Cojo, thats a nice little piece on NFL History

**pattyosviKING** · 06-13-2008, 07:10 AM

"shockzilla" wrote:

WOW - that is so WEIRD! The head coach - Dann Lickness - I went to high school with him, he was a couple grades below me. Hmm, small world.

Bet there's a lot of Lick(ness)ing on that team. :'(

**Marrdro** · 06-13-2008, 07:52 AM

"pattyosviKING" wrote:

"shockzilla" wrote:

WOW - that is so WEIRD! The head coach - Dann Lickness - I went to high school with him, he was a couple grades below me. Hmm, small world.

Bet there's a lot of Lick(ness)ing on that team. :'(

You mean carpet munchers??

**pattyosviKING** · 06-13-2008, 10:18 AM

"Marrdro" wrote:

"pattyosviKING" wrote:

"shockzilla" wrote:

WOW - that is so WEIRD! The head coach - Dann Lickness - I went to high school with him, he was a couple grades below me. Hmm, small world.

Bet there's a lot of Lick(ness)ing on that team. :'(

You mean carpet munchers??

Don't know that even they would think it's worth munching.
Maybe just a lick here and there.

**pack93z** · 06-13-2008, 10:43 AM