His name wasn't McNally and his uniform wasn't blue: Adventures in unpacking Packers facts

GREEN BAY – Cliff Christl wasn't wrong about the color of Johnny Blood's uniform. He just wasn't right yet.

The uniform on a statue of Blood in the Packers Heritage Plaza in downtown Green Bay was originally painted blue, which Christl concurred with mostly because he didn't have time not to.

"I had about 24 hours to make a decision," Christl said of the statue. "I thought, 'I don’t know enough yet to say they weren’t (blue),' even though I had my doubts. So I said let’s go ahead and paint it blue. My mistake, because within a year or two I realized those uniforms were not blue, they were gold."

The statue was repainted to reflect the gold color, but wasn't quite right, so it was touched up recently to get it closer to accurate.

As Packers team historian, Christl occasionally needs time to uncover the truth, but he never stops looking and learning.

There has been a lot of misinformation about Packers uniforms over the years, Christl says, most of it from the pre-Lombardi years. It was Vince Lombardi who introduced in 1959 the green and gold uniforms the Packers have mostly stuck with since.

Christl uncovered enough evidence about the 1929 and 1930 years to leave no doubt that a gold jersey with blue circle on the chest is accurate.

A color photo published in 1930s Milwaukee Journal, one of the first newspapers to print color photographs, leaves no doubt, as do written descriptions in sports stories of the time.

A story in the Green Bay Press-Gazette on July 24, 1929, said, “The Packers will have new uniforms this season with a color scheme of blue trimming and a gold background instead of blue with a background with gold trimming of last year.”

Ok, so no points for style or grammar, and maybe you could see how somebody could have trouble untwisting that, but throughout the season the team was referred to in game stories in Green Bay, New York and Chicago papers as the gold-jerseyed Packers.

The Packers did wear blue uniforms of various designs at different times, until Lombardi came along, but it is doubtful they ever wore a blue jersey with gold or yellow circle on the chest.

The Packers won three consecutive championships from 1929-31, and Blood was their brightest star, although perhaps not as bright as his statue ended up being before the final retouching.

"Thankfully they repainted that to at least get the right color, but it was painted a mustard yellow, like the uniform of today, whereas in 1929 and '30, when Johnny Blood wore that uniform, it was more of a gold color," Christl said.

Oscar León and Jessica LoPresti of Sculpture Resource in Highland Park, Illinois, were in Green Bay to make the changes. The pair both worked for the Fine Art Studio of Rotblatt-Amrany of Highland Park when the statues were sculpted, and León sculpted the George Whitney Calhoun statue in the plaza.

The re-repainting is designed to give Blood's jersey and socks a more rustic or antique tone so they are closer to the original uniforms and also don't stand out as much among the other, more muted, statues. León and LoPresti removed the protective coatings over the paint, added a brown wash to the yellow uniform and reapplied the protective layers.

"I think we got a fair amount of negative reaction, just because it didn’t blend in with the rest of the plaza, with the other uniforms. I don’t know how many people realize the blue was incorrect," Christl said.

The plaza, the focal element of the Packers Heritage Trail, includes statues of Blood, Bart Starr and young Mary Heather Hendrickson, George Calhoun, Paul Hornung, Clarke Hinkle and 11-year-old Donald Hamacher, and a Lumberjack Band member. The plaza was unveiled in September 2013.

Christl did know which color the Lumberjack Band member's jacket should be.

"Everybody wanted to paint that green or gray, believing those were the colors that the lumberjack band wore, which they did in the ’50s and ‘60s," he said. "But that was taken from a late 1930s picture, and during that time the band wore red suit jackets, so I insisted we paint that red to get that accurate. Especially after blowing the Blood jersey originally."

(A side note, the plaque with the statue says "Johnny (Blood) McNally," which, if you want to get Christl really riled up, call that Packers player by any name but Johnny Blood. But that's a whole different story).

The Packers have taken over administration of the Heritage Trail from the founding committee, mostly because of the expense of maintaining insurance, and Christl said they've supported the changes.

"The Packers have been very good about giving consideration to getting the Blood jersey correct and moving along with it," he said. "Mark’s been great. I can kind of always trust him if I show him my research."

Mark being Packers President and CEO Mark Murphy.

There are other jerseys the team historian is uncertain about. And some he knows were carelessly promoted.

"There was a company in Canada that created a wall plaque with Packers jerseys ... that Pro Football Hall of Fame bought into. I don’t know why, because several of those jerseys are incorrect, including the blue-colored jersey in the 1920s. And that’s what has been copied," Christl said.

"For the life of me, I don’t know how anybody who knows how difficult it was to research in the Press-Gazette, prior to it going online in Newspapers.com, would not question a company in Canada creating a uniform history for the Green Bay Packers."

Getting the uniforms correct is important on several fronts. Packers fans, of course, are quite persnickety about such things, and the team makes a decent amount of money on marketing throwback jerseys.

The Packers were careful to not call their current throwback jersey a throwback jersey. Like those movies that say "based on actual events," the 50s Classic Uniform is based on uniforms worn in the '50s, but modernized in several ways. The 1950s version could be worn with yellow, white or green pants. Yellow pants are out, as are striped socks. The modern version includes dark-green pants, and no Packers "G" on gold helmets. The uniforms will be worn one game a year for the next four years.

As for Christl, his research on uniforms, and any other facts about the Packers not already uncovered for his comprehensive four-volume team history, "The Greatest Story in Sports," will continue.

Contact Richard Ryman at (920) 431-8342 or rryman@gannett.com. Follow him on Twitter at @RichRymanPG, on Instagram at @rrymanPG or on Facebook at www.facebook.com/RichardRymanPG/.

This article originally appeared on Green Bay Press-Gazette: Johnny Blood's name wasn't McNally and his Packers uniform wasn't blue