For over a hundred years, American football has been associated with cheerleading. First in schools, whether at the high school, college or university level. Most fairly large educational institutions with a student football club had, and still have, a group of cheerleaders to support them.
National Football League (NFL) clubs were exceptions to this rule, until 1961, when the Pittsburgh Steelers, in conjunction with Robert Morris Junior College, decided to form a women's cheerleading team to cheer on the local club's players and spectators, also in hopes of improving ticket sales to Steelers games. Because in those years, the team had little success on the field, which hurt ticket sales.
In 1961, William Day, an administrator at the Robert Morris college, who was also the entertainment coordinator for the Steelers, had this idea to hold tryouts at the college and select a group of young female students to perform on the field during Steelers games. Robert Morris was a small college without a football team, and the students had unofficially adopted the Steelers as «their team». So it was a natural union...
At tryouts, candidates were evaluated on their athletic ability, coordination, personality, gymnastics, and appearance. They also had to know football well to prove that they would know when to cheer. At games, the performed choreographed jazz routines to live jazz music performed by Harold Betters and band leader Benny Benack. Steelerettes received one free ticket per game as pay.
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| 1961 |
Without realizing it, the young Steelerettes were making history as the first cheerleading squad in the NFL. They would be adorned in outfits befitting of the steel town image of Pittsburgh. Their uniforms consisted of gold knee-lenght bibbed jumpers and hard hats.
The first group of Steelerettes that cheered during the 1961 season were : Eleanor Lineman (Captain), Virginia Davis, Patricia Zuvella, Margaret Hensler, Dolly Merante, Margie McCormick, Sandy McEachran, Linda Walters and Barbara Bishop.
Contrary to their habits, the Pittsburgh Steelers had more success at home that year, winning four of their seven games. And the Steelerettes proved to be a tremendous success with both the fans and the media.
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| 1963 |
The 1962 season started off with a frenzy of public appearances. When the squad was selected, Bob Prince interviewed them on his weekly TV show, and they were being mentioned in newspaper articles. The Pittsburgh Steelerettes had become the darlings of the local sports scene.
A group of young men, called «the Ingots», who were also Robert Morris students, were added to complement and assist the cheerleaders in their routines. But the experience lasted only one season. The Ingots did not return in 1963.
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| 1964 |
That year (1963), the Steelerettes uniforms were a bit brighter and the girls no longer had to wear the hard hats. They were making regular appearances at charity functions, hospitals and schools. The talented ladies were also regular performers during halftime at the Duquesne University basketball games.
The squad was increased to ten girls, which made it possible to do a classic pyramid, which from then on became one of the Steelerettes trademark routines.
Carefully choreographed acrobatic maneuvers were used to disassemble the pyramid. The girl in the top position did a backflip onto the field, then a series of cartwheels ending in a split to begin the formation. The next two did their backflips and cartwheels ending in a split on each side of the first and so on until we ended up forming a «V» on the field. The girls performed this several times during the game and it was a genuine crowd pleaser.
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| 1968 |
But the pyramid was difficult to pull-off, and sometimes the girls collapsed into pile. The 1963 Steelerettes, as well as the 1969 squad, are immortalized in the Pro Football Hall of Fame. Among the films that are shown in the theater are bloopers. The opening scenes of two such films show the pyramids collapsing in one of the Steelerettes humorous heaps.
Another well-rehearsed routine was the line dance that followed every Steelers score, performed to the rhythm of the «Pittsburgh Steelers Fight Song».
By the 1967 season, the idea of having cheerleaders on the sidelines had cought the attention of several other NFL teams, most notably the Dallas Cowboys, and times were changing. The Steelerettes had always projected a wholesome, collegiate type image while the new wave of NFL cheerleaders mimicked the Cowboys cheerleaders and their go-go dancing «Rockettes» style.
The Steelerettes were starting to look a bit outdated.
By the late 1960's, Robert Morris' students body had grown and the school now had its own football team. The decision to disband the Steelerettes was a joint decision between the Rooney family (owner of the Steelers) and Robert Morris. Apparently, the cheerleaders wished to wear outfits that were more «modern» and «daring».
In response, the «very conservative» owner fired the team. The last squad of Steelerettes left the field after the 1969 season, when the Steelers lost 13 of their 14 games. They would never come back.
The Pittsburgh Steelers, to this day, are still among the few NFL teams that do not have cheerleaders.
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Three years later, Dallas Cowboys general manager Tex Schramm asked fashion designer Paula Van Wagoner to «modernize» the cheerleaders' uniforms of the team. The result was the 1972 iconic DCC uniform which is in the Smithsonium Museum today...
