The NFL has successfully invented a new timeslot with the Packers and Rams playing on “Thanksgiving Eve” this year.
And though a game on the night before Thanksgiving might be a new phenomenon, it’s not the first time the Packers have played on a Wednesday. Buckle up, because this is a weird one.
Though it’s happened before, chances are very, very good you’ve never seen the Packers play on a Wednesday. In fact, I’d be willing to bet that if you’re reading this, your parents haven’t ever seen it, either.
Even your grandparents probably have a pretty limited chance; my paternal grandfather was born in 1934, and he would have been just four years old the last time the Packers lined up for a Wednesday contest.
The year was 1938, and your Green Bay Packers had just wrapped up a 28-7 victory over the Chicago Cardinals at Wisconsin’s State Fair Park. And fresh off that victory, they’d pack up that whole squad and head east for a battle with that very same Chicago Cardinals squad at the brand new Buffalo Civic Stadium, which would go on to be known as War Memorial Stadium and serve as the future home of the Buffalo Bills.
The Bills were still a far off dream, but that didn’t stop local boosters from trying to drum up interest in professional football. One such individual was a man by the name of Charlie Murray, who was cited by the Green Bay Press-Gazette as the main point of contact for Green Bay football in the area.
“Murray,” wrote eminent Green Bay columnist George Whitney Calhoun the morning of the game, “is expecting a 20,000 plus crowd at tonight’s National league contest between the Chicago Cardinals and the Green Bay Packers.”
That was a pretty conservative estimate for Murray, who was probably wise to undersell his hopes for attendance. Better to undersell the prospects for pro football in Buffalo and overdeliver than the alternative. It was a particularly wise move given that the stadium sat a reported 40,000 fans, who could view the proceedings under a state-of-the-art, $160,000 lighting system, a rarity at the time, but much appreciated by Calhoun, who wrote that the lights could “make the gridiron bright as day for the starlight games.”
And, for Murray’s part, it looked like he had employed a savvy strategy. The Press-Gazette reported more than 1,500 curious fans came out to watch the Packers practice on Tuesday after they emerged from their train journey from Wisconsin. The citizens of Buffalo, it seemed, had an appetite for football.
And that appetite would be satisfied.
Somewhere between 17,000 (according to the Buffalo Courier-Express) and 20,000 (according to the Green Bay Press-Gazette) fans showed up to see the Packers and Cardinals battle out a tightly fought game. The Cardinals weren’t content to go quite as quietly as they had at State Fair Park just a few days prior, battling back after Cecil Isbell and Don Huston built a 21-6 lead to take a 22-21 advantage with just a few minutes to go, only to see the Packers snatch the game away at the very end. Tiny Engebretsen booted through the game-winning field goal with just a couple of minutes to go, and the Packers’ defense hung on to seal the deal.
Engebretsen received postgame accolades for his trouble, but seemed unimpressed.
“The game ball was given right away to Engebretsen, who seemed as cool as a cucumber,” Calhoun wrote in his postgame report. “He tucked the ball under his top jacket and wended his way to the Packer bus while a young army of hero worshippers followed in his wake, singing his praises to the skies.”
If Packers’ response via Engebretsen was understated, the city of Buffalo was thrilled. News of the game made the front page of the Buffalo Courier-Express, just below the front page, displaced only by a headline reading “Hitler halts war moves for 24 hours while four nations seek peace formula.” The breathless coverage of the game seemed to bode well for the future of football in the city, though the professional game would not arrive there until the Buffalo Bisons of the All American Football Conference formed in 1946. They later changed their name to the Buffalo Bills and paved the way for the version of the team that bears that name today.
Coincidentally, the Bills are opening up a new stadium this season, which means that very indirectly, football fans in Buffalo can thank the Packers for helping to stoke the flames of professional football in their city. Would the Bills be playing in their new digs had the Packers not played a Wednesday game nearly a century ago? We can’t say for sure the two aren’t connected.
