By Ken Dooley

The Brown Bombers football team was founded in the summer of 1935 by Herschel “Rip” Day, a Black athletic promoter in Harlem. The team was named in honor of the rising young heavyweight boxing contender, Joe Louis. There had been several black professional teams in Harlem of modest caliber in the early 1930s. Still, Day was determined to make the Brown Bombers the finest Black professional eleven in the nation. Frederick D. “Fritz” Pollard, who had moved to New York from Chicago in 1933 and owned a black weekly tabloid newspaper, agreed to coach the Brown Bombers because he was concerned about the failure of NFL owners to sign Black players.

Pollard was a natural choice to coach the Brown Bombers because he had a long association with college and professional football, both as a player and coach. He played halfback on Brown University team, which went to the Rosebowl in 1916. Pollard was the first African American to be named to Walter Camp’s All-American team. In 1919, while Pollard was coaching at Lincoln University, a Black college near Philadelphia, he was recruited to play halfback for the Akron Indians in the informal Ohio league. Pollard became one of the brilliant runners and important gate attractions in the American Professional Football Association and later the NFL from 1920-26. During these years, he coached NFL teams in Akron, Milwaukee, and Hammond.

 From his experience in the pro game, Pollard was keenly aware of the hostility some players and owners felt toward Black players. In 1926, New York Giant management refused to allow its team to take the field in a game against Canton at the Polo Grounds until Bulldog quarterback Sol Butler, one of five Blacks in big-time pro football that year, voluntarily withdrew from the game. Only one Black player, Fred “Duke” Slater of the Chicago Cardinals, remained on an NFL roster the following year. It was clear to Pollard that some owners would be pleased if all Blacks were eliminated from the NFL.

Pollard brought in former Chicago Cardinal halfback Joe Lillard as the centerpiece of the Brown Bomber team. He signed former New York University and Brooklyn Dodger wingback Dave Meyers and ex-Morgan College star Thomas “Tank” Conrad to help provide a potent offense. The Bomber line was anchored by former Providence College star Howard “Dixie” Matthews, considered by many as the greatest athlete in Rhode Island history. (Matthews was inducted into The Rhode Island Heritage Hall of Fame in 1985.) 

Scheduling only white professional teams from the northeast and playing their games at Dyckman Oval across the river from Harlem in the Bronx, the Bombers got off to a fast start. In the opening game, they humiliated a much-touted team organized by former Army All-America, Chris Cagle (28-6) and then proceeded to demolish (27-0) an all-star eleven led by Cliff Montgomery, who had quarterbacked Columbia University to a Rose Bowl victory a few years before. As a gauge of the quality of the Bomber team, Cagle’s all-stars had barely lost an exhibition game to the 1934 NFL champion New York Giants. Joe “Pop” Lillard provided a good part of the offense, but he was ably assisted by wingback Dave Meyers and 6′ 3″, 240-pound fullback Tank Conrad, who was dubbed the “Negro Nagurski,” and “Dixie” Matthews, the best end in football. After five games, the Brown Bombers were undefeated, racking up ninety-two points to their opponent’s nine.

Pollard showcased the best available black football talent to undermine some NFL owners’ claim that qualified Black players were scarce. He tried to schedule exhibition games with the local NFL teams, the Brooklyn Dodgers, and the New York Giants. Neither the Dodgers nor the Giants were interested in playing the Brown Bombers. Pollard later claimed that New York Giants owner Tim Mara and Chicago Bears owner George Halas were responsible for the ban on Black players. 

During the late summer of 1936, after Pollard welcomed his son, Fritz, Jr., home from the Berlin Olympic games where the young Pollard (inducted into The Rhode Island Heritage Hall of Fame in 2004) had won a bronze medal in the 110-meter-high hurdles, Fritz, Sr., prepared for a second season as coach of the Brown Bombers. Once again, he was unable to schedule an exhibition game with local NFL teams and was forced to start the season on the road with a series of warm-up games because Dyckman Oval, which was also used by Negro Leagues baseball teams, was not available until mid-October. Starting with a makeshift lineup, the Bombers lost their first four contests. But, when the regulars arrived for the home opener against the Newark Bears of the newly organized American Professional Football League (considered one of the top minor leagues), it became apparent that Pollard had once again put together one of the country’s best minor league professional teams. In addition to the mainstays of the 1935 team, Lillard and Conrad, Pollard recruited former Morgan College triple-threat sensation Otis Troupe, who would share season-scoring honors with Lillard. Pollard had “Dixie” Matthews, the Providence College sensation, to anchor the line. The Bombers humbled the Bears, 41-0, before 3,000 fans at Dyckman Oval and proceeded to dominate the opposition for the rest of the season, recording six wins, no defeats, and one tie. Considering the rout of the Newark Bears of the upstart American League and a 29-0 whitewash of the still highly regarded Frankford Yellowjackets, Pollard could legitimately claim that he had demonstrated that many Black players could play in the NFL. Yet, as before, the league owners showed no interest in either scheduling or recruiting players from the Brown Bombers.

Pollard stayed on for another season as coach of the Brown Bombers but became increasingly pessimistic about the prospects of altering what more clearly seemed to be a ban against Blacks playing in the NFL. The Bombers enjoyed another successful season by posting a 5-2-1 record, including a 29-0 victory over the Jersey City Giants of the American Professional Football League. Pollard was prepared to coach the Bombers for another season before a challenge from a rival group of Black sports promoters caused him to change his mind. He immediately resigned as coach.

 When he was asked about the Brown Bomber team in 1970, Pollard said, “When I organized that team, there weren’t any Black players in the pro leagues. I did that deliberately to show them that these teams could play against a whole Black team, not have trouble, and could draw a good crowd.”

“Fritz Pollard did more to advance the idea of the best against the best regardless of color than any single man in the business,” Dan Burkey, a columnist for The Amsterdam News, wrote in 1980. The College Football Hall of Fame recognized Pollard’s talent and extraordinary pioneering efforts by inducting him in 1954. He was inducted into The Rhode Island Heritage Hall of Fame in 1967.

Ken Dooley is a director of The Heritage Harbor Foundation.