History of the NFL league offices

[Rupert Patrick]

A question for the forum - I know the NFL offices moved from Chicago to Philadelphia in 1946 when Bert Bell became Commissioner; the move to Philadelphia was one of the conditions for his taking the job. Had the league offices been in Chicago from 1920-1946? Also, was it Rozelle who initiated the move of the league office to New York City, or did that happen before he became Commissioner? I was unable to find anything online that documented the history of the moves of the League offices, but was thinking somebody might be able to shed some light on this. Thanks in advance.

[BD Sullivan]

Bell actually started out running the office in NYC, but soon switched to the Philly suburbs. Rozelle's NYC office officially opened on July 11, 1960. Soon after he was elected, that was one of his priorities.

[TanksAndSpartans]

I read Chris Willis's Panhandles book, but not the Carr bio. I think when Carr succeeded Thorpe, the league office was in Columbus, OH for a while.

[Reaser]

I read Chris Willis's Panhandles book, but not the Carr bio.

Read the Carr bio, highly recommended. Made the short-list of books I keep on my desk. Plus, obviously, covers periods of time you're interested in.

[Andrew McKillop]

I did a bit of research on this a few years ago. Here is the old blog post with street addresses and other trivia:
https://web.archive.org/web/20180407161 ... dquarters/

[Rupert Patrick]

I did a bit of research on this a few years ago. Here is the old blog post with street addresses and other trivia:
https://web.archive.org/web/20180407161 ... dquarters/

Thank you.

This question came from a concern I had when editing my portion of the PFRA 1951 Rams book about how to properly write correct endnotes when referencing the NFL Record and Fact Book and the 1952 NFL Record and Rules Manual after using them as sources. The issue I had was that these NFL publications seemingly have no author and no external publisher (such as Simon and Schuster, or McFarland - there is no "Published By" anywhere in the book, and the copyright is held by the National Football League), and that the NFL has had their internal publishing operation for many years now, who (I believe) has also been publishing the Game Day stadium magazines, the Super Bowl programs, and the Annual NFL Guides, at least until the Record and Fact book went pretty much digital a couple years back. I wasn't sure how to write the correct endnote when referencing these NFL publications when I didn't know who the author was, who the publisher was, and in what city the book was published. It's a conundrum of sorts.

[TanksAndSpartans]

Rupert, I did this for a CC article:

2016 Official NFL Record & Fact Book. NFL.com. Accessed August 18, 2016. http://www.nfl.com/static/content/publi ... 502939.pdf

[Andrew McKillop]

I found a small note in the L.A. Times that listed Joseph T. Labrum as the editor of the 1952 NFL Record and Rules Manual. Labrum was the NFL's director of publicity from 1947 to 1961.
https://www.newspapers.com/clip/3515087 ... les_times/