The five "best" books about pro football history

[rhickok1109]

People from a website called Shepherd approached me a while back and asked me if I would put together a list of the five best books about pro football history.
I generally dislike the five best or 10 best or whatever best approach to anything but I agreed to do it (partly, I admit, because it also gave me a chance to plug my Johnny Blood book).
The approach I took, though, was to choose the five books that, put together, would give the reader the most thorough knowledge of pro football history.
With that in mind, I chose these five books:
The League: The Rise and Decline of the NFL by David Harris
The Sunday Game: At the Dawn of Professional Football by Keith McClellan
America's Game: The Epic Story of How Pro Football Captured a Nation by Michael MacCambridge
The Man Who Built the National Football League: Joe F. Carr by Chris Willis
The Greatest Story in Sports: Green Bay Packers 1919-2019 by Cliff Christl
You can read about why I made those choices on the Shepherd website:
https://shepherd.com/best-books/the-his ... o-football
Discussion is more than welcome.

[RyanChristiansen]

I would argue that Pigskin: The Early Years of Pro Football by Robert W. Peterson might be a good replacement for Christl's team-specific Packers book.

Also, I have run into multiple errors related to the Minneapolis Marines and the Rock Island Independents in a couple of chapters in The Sunday Game by McClellan. It appears that McClellan relied upon home team newspapers for information about the visiting teams that they faced, and those newspapers got it all wrong. I feel bad for McClellan, and I just want to caution folks to be sure to rely on local newspapers first, in the pre-NFL era, especially.

[Bob Gill]

I would argue that Pigskin: The Early Years of Pro Football by Robert W. Peterson might be a good replacement for Christl's team-specific Packers book.

Also, I have run into multiple errors related to the Minneapolis Marines and the Rock Island Independents in a couple of chapters in The Sunday Game by McClellan. It appears that McClellan relied upon home team newspapers for information about the visiting teams that they faced, and those newspapers got it all wrong. I feel bad for McClellan, and I just want to caution folks to be sure to rely on local newspapers first, in the pre-NFL era, especially.

I agree about Pigskin. Not necessarily that it should replace the Packers book (or books, I guess I should say), but I'd knock off one of the others and replace it with Pigskin.

The point about the McClellan book is fair, and I also think the writing in it is often clunky and repetitive, but I'd still keep it because there's just no other book that covers that era in anything like the same level of detail.

I'd also be tempted to add the Pro Football Chronicle, by Dan Daly and Bob O'Donnell, even though it's not really a history but more like an addendum that's meant to accompany a complete history. It's entertaining and informative, anyway.

[JeffreyMiller]

I think I'd add Pigskin, as mentioned earlier, and TOTAL FOOTBALL. While TF may have outlived its usefulness, I found it essential when I was just entering into the world of football research.

But I agree with Ralph, I don't like lists like these because there so many great books and so many different categories ... and series! The PP&K books were my introduction into the world of pro football reading, and of course there are the Olderman books. Biographies, team histories, encyclopedias, how-to books, other league histories, etc ... it goes on and on ...

[ChrisBabcock]

The recently published The NFL Century by Joe Horrigan deserves an honorable mention for a history of the league book.. But I wouldn't put it above America's Game or Pigskin.

[Bryan]

As a kid, my favorite football history books was the 1981 Creative Education series written by Julian May and James Rothaus. Each team had their own book, and you would learn about the history of each franchise. The number of old photographs included in each book was/is pretty amazing...I haven't seen anything as comprehensive since.

[JohnTurney]

People from a website called Shepherd approached me a while back and asked me if I would put together a list of the five best books about pro football history.
I generally dislike the five best or 10 best or whatever best approach to anything but I agreed to do it (partly, I admit, because it also gave me a chance to plug my Johnny Blood book).
The approach I took, though, was to choose the five books that, put together, would give the reader the most thorough knowledge of pro football history.
With that in mind, I chose these five books:
The League: The Rise and Decline of the NFL by David Harris
The Sunday Game: At the Dawn of Professional Football by Keith McClellan
America's Game: The Epic Story of How Pro Football Captured a Nation by Michael MacCambridge
The Man Who Built the National Football League: Joe F. Carr by Chris Willis
The Greatest Story in Sports: Green Bay Packers 1919-2019 by Cliff Christl
You can read about why I made those choices on the Shepherd website:
https://shepherd.com/best-books/the-his ... o-football
Discussion is more than welcome.

ohh, all great ones there ... and so many wonderful books out there

[GameBeforeTheMoney]

I know it's a baseball book, but Lords of the Realm taught me more about how labor negotiations in the NFL work and how the CBA truly affects the game. Highly recommend. Even though it's about baseball, it's so good that it gives you a great perspective of football history as well. Great insight on the difference of the MLB and NFL unions and the effects that had on both leagues. Again, I know it's a baseball book but in some ways it truly is indirectly one of the most important books I've read in understanding aspects of football history.

[Bryan]

I know it's a baseball book, but Lords of the Realm taught me more about how labor negotiations in the NFL work and how the CBA truly affects the game. Highly recommend. Even though it's about baseball, it's so good that it gives you a great perspective of football history as well. Great insight on the difference of the MLB and NFL unions and the effects that had on both leagues. Again, I know it's a baseball book but in some ways it truly is indirectly one of the most important books I've read in understanding aspects of football history.

I second the excellence of Lords of the Realm. Its a great book, its a great book about labor/management, and its a great sports book (in that order). I think the closest thing to it in terms of NFL is Ralph's listed book of "The League". I was always intimidated by "The League" as a kid...it seemed really long and didn't have any pictures!