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The real leather heads of Duluth

By BILL WARD, Star Tribune

Last update: April 2, 2008 - 5:43 PM

The Duluth Eskimos wore igloos on their jerseys, included three future Hall of Famers and, thanks to mega-draw Ernie Nevers, were credited by National Football League President Joe Carr with "saving the league." Now they're being truly immortalized with a George Clooney movie, "Leatherheads," opening Friday.

10 BITS OF ESKIMOS LORE:

• In 1925, the four owners of the Duluth Kelleys (named after a sponsoring hardware store) offered to give the team to treasurer Ole Haugsrud. When they met to finalize the deal, he insisted on paying $1 -- which the parties promptly spent on nickel beers.

• The Eskimos were the first pro-football team to have an out-of-town training camp -- all the way up in Two Harbors.

• The 1926-27 team played 29 games in just under 17 weeks, only one of them in Duluth. "The Iron Men of the North" had games in five cities over eight days.

• Star halfback Johnny (Blood) McNally fell in love with a woman at a Cleveland hotel. Except it turned out to be Harpo Marx in drag.

• Star Ernie Nevers, a native of Willow River, Minn., was paid $50,000 for the 1926-27 season; the other players earned $75 for each victory, $60 for a tie and $50 for a loss.

• Nevers played all but 26 of the 1,740 minutes the team logged that season.

• The players showered twice after each game: first in their uniforms to launder them, and then a "regular" shower. They hung the uniforms out of train windows to dry.

• Haugsrud once chased another team's owner, who had shorted him $70 in receipts, into a ladies' restroom -- and came out with the money.

• In public, the team wore white Mackinaw coats adorned with igloos on the back.

• When Haugsrud sold the team in 1929, the league gave him an option on Minnesota's next franchise. In 1960, he paid $60,000 for 10 percent of the Vikings; his share was worth $2 million when he died in 1976.