NEW YORK — As Nebraska returns to the site on Saturday of its first bowl win more than six decades ago, one man’s trash is beginning to look like another man’s treasure.
In Nebraska football lore, the Huskers’ 36-34 victory against Miami in the 1962 Gotham Bowl holds a special place.
The game program from that event is a piece of memorabilia unlike almost all others. And it seems that a New York man has cornered the market on the remaining programs.
We’ll get to that.
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First, though, in 20 days since the Pinstripe Bowl selected Nebraska to play Boston College in this 14th postseason college football game at the new Yankee Stadium, several stories of nostalgia have emerged.
You could expect as much. Nebraska has played in 53 bowl games. It appeared in 35 over a 35-season stretch that ended in 2004.
With rich tradition come legendary tales.
That inaugural bowl win arrived in the second — and last — Gotham Bowl, played on the third Saturday in December of coach Bob Devaney’s first season. It was contested at the original Yankee Stadium, which stood until 2010 one block to the south of the current home of the Bronx Bombers. A crowd of a reported fewer than 2,000 people attended on a frigid afternoon at the House That Ruth Built.
Memories live on with the likes of James Fogarty, a former newspaper reporter who came into possession of a game-used football from that Gotham Bowl, and Erny Bonistall, a New Yorker who played for the Huskers in their groundbreaking win.
#FlashbackFriday to the first bowl game played here at Yankee Stadium. Nebraska downed Miami 36-34 in the 1962 Gotham Bowl. #FootballFriday pic.twitter.com/IxNvVhwV0m
— Yankee Stadium (@yankeestadium) September 29, 2017
The famed sellout streak at Memorial Stadium began in Devaney’s first season. It reached 400 games this year.
There is history involved, too, for Matt Rhule, the second-year Nebraska coach who lived in New York for a decade as a child. Rhule has waxed several times this month about his fond feelings for the city. He led the Nebraska players through a practice at the New York Giants facility on Monday. The Huskers attended a Knicks game on Christmas day and visited Central Park, the 9/11 Memorial and Museum and the New York Stock Exchange.
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On Friday, Rhule got a close look at the Pinstripe venue during a walkthrough for both teams.
“To be here is amazing,” he said. “To be in the Yankees locker room is amazing, to be surrounded by greatness.”
Inside the Yankee Stadium Museum, beneath Babe Ruth’s uniform and displayed in an angled panel, sits a 1962 Gotham Bowl program. It is the only artifact held by the Yankees — who operate the Pinstripe Bowl — from Nebraska’s last visit here.
In Nebraska, a 1962 Gotham Bowl program was listed for sale several months ago by Husker Hounds, an Omaha specialty store that sells memorabilia and apparel. The asking price was $2,200.
A spokesman for the Nebraska athletic department said he was unsure if the school owned a copy.
There are a few out there. An eBay retailer in New York said he sold one this year for $10,000. He didn’t tell me who bought it. But he said, after listing the item, that he heard from people desperate to own it, telling him “it would complete their collection.”
He has more of the programs. I saw photos — not the shots available to the public on eBay; rather photos I requested from him in an effort to verify the existence of his memorabilia.
His name is John. He’s 20 years old. He requested his last name and exact location be withheld for his safety and the security of the programs. Friday, I met with him at a coffee shop outside of the city. He brought one of his programs. I paged through it. It’s in excellent condition. It appears authentic.
Then again, I’m not a professional authenticator.
The two-season Gotham Bowl struggled financially, which led to its collapse. (Photo courtesy of John)
John said he acquired the Gotham Bowl programs from his father, who managed an apartment complex in Yonkers, N.Y., from 1993 to 1998. A tenant who moved out during that time was the son of a person connected to one of the participating teams, according to John.
The tenant left behind a box. He asked John’s father to discard it with the rest of the tenant’s garbage.
Inside that box were Gotham Bowl programs, John said. His father held onto them, unaware of their value. John said he discovered them recently. He’s not a fan of football. He knew nothing about the history of bowl games in New York.
John began to learn about the programs, he said, only after he listed the first one for a much lower price than $10,000.
“I’m just trying to get an idea (of what they’re worth),” he said.
That, of course, depends on John’s next move. And ultimately perhaps, what the public or a sports organization is willing to pay.
No matter the resolution, it adds to Nebraska’s intriguing bowl history in New York — with another chapter on tap Saturday in the Bronx.
(Photo courtesy of John)
