Looking Back At The Last Bears-Packers Playoff Game
CHICAGO (CBS/WBBM) -- The last time the Bears met the Packers in a playoff game was on Dec. 14, 1941.
Needless to say, Chicago was a very different place back then.
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In 1941, Ed Kelly was mayor of Chicago, building what historians would later call one of the most powerful, and most corrupt, big city political organizations.
Future mayor Richard J. Daley was serving as Illinois State Senate minority leader in Springfield. His son, Mayor Richard M. Daley, wouldn't be born for another four months.
Republican Dwight Green was in the Illinois governor's office, having been swept in on a wave of backlash against the New Deal and the Democrats.
Franklin Delano Roosevelt had begun his third term in office earlier in the year.
The attack on Pearl Harbor had happened just a week earlier, and the nation remained in shock.
WBBM-AM radio was broadcasting from the Wrigley Building, playing a variety of music and talk programming. The station wouldn't become an all-news outlet for another 25 years.
Channel 2 was occupied by the experimental W9XBK-TV. WBBM-TV as we know it today wouldn't come into existence for another 12 years, and none of the other present-day TV stations were on the air back then either. But a lot of people didn't have a TV set in their houses anyway back then.
But what about the game?
Back then, the Bears shared Wrigley Field with the Cubs, and were coached by the legendary George "Papa Bear" Halas.
Both the Bears and the Packers had finished tied at the top of the western division with 10-1 records. The Bears had beaten the Packers 25-17 in the regular season at Green Bay City Stadium on Sept. 28, while the Packers had defeated the Bears 16-14 at Wrigley, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel recalled.
In the playoff game, the Bears took the lead 7-0 when the Bears fumbled away the opening kickoff. But the Bears went on to score 24 points in the second quarter, and ended up winning the game 33-14 thanks to a rushing attack by George McAfee, Norm Standlee and Hugh Gallarneau, the Journal Sentinel reported.
The Bears went on to win the NFL Championship Game (it wouldn't be called the Super Bowl until the 1966-67 season) on Dec. 21, against the New York Giants.
And while the players' names might not be so familiar anymore, the Bears continue to honor "Papa Bear" Halas to this day. They carry his initials – G.S.H. for George Stanley Halas – on their sleeves.
