History of the football helmet gridiron until 1939 and were not made mandatory in the National Football League until 1943 As a side note, "the last NFL player to play in a game without a helmet was Dick Plasman an end for the Chicago Bears in 1940." There is a photograph of him without one taken during the 1940 NFL Championship Game in which Chicago defeated the Washington Redskins 73–0. Before the invention of the football helmet, players would often grow their hair long, because they believed it would protect their heads. The man largely credited with inventing the first helmet was George Barclay. In
1947 NFL Championship Game 1947 NFL Championship Game The 1947 National Football League Championship Game was the 15th annual National Football League (NFL) championship game, held December 28 at Comiskey Park in Chicago. The attendance was 30,759, well The game featured the Western Division champion Chicago Cardinals and the Eastern Division champion Philadelphia Eagles A week earlier, the Eagles defeated the Pittsburgh Steelers in a tiebreaker playoff to determine the Eastern winner. Both the Eagles and Cardinals were making their first appearances in the championship game. The Cardinals had won the regular season meeting in Philadelphia three weeks earlier by 24 points and after