Dan Fortmann team captain, he led the Bears to back-to-back NFL championships in 1940 and 1941 with records of 8–3 and 10–1. After the 1940 season, Fortmann was rated as the best lineman in the NFL. The United Press called him "the heart and soul" of the Bears' ground attack that "rolled up a vast amount of yardage overland." In the 1940 NFL Championship Game, the Bears defeated the Washington Redskins by a 73-0 score. Fortman later cited the 1940 championship game as proof of Halas' skill as a "master of psychology." The Bears had lost to the Redskins three weeks earlier,
History of the Chicago Bears brought on for the second straight season a rookie who made an immediate impact with the team as Ron Bull won the NFL Rookie of the Year Award as the Bears finished in 3rd place in the Conference with a solid 9–5 record. The Bears' rookie success hit a pinnacle in 1963 as the Bears broke the Green Bay Packers three-year stranglehold on the Western Division and the NFL by posting an 11–1–2 record. In the NFL Championship Game at Wrigley Field the Bears battled the New York Giants in front of 45,801 fans on a bone-chilling afternoon. The Bears