Jim Foster (American football)
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James Foster is the inventor of the game of Arena Football, (and US patent recipient), the founder and first commissioner of the Arena Football League (AFL).[1]
He is also a former
Biography
Born and raised in
In 1974 He founded, played and served as club director of the Newton Nite Hawks minor league football team of the Northern States AAA Pro Football League (NSFL). After winning the league championship in 1975, Foster worked with a well known European soccer coach and sports promoter Bob Kapp, to organize and introduce the sport of American (pro level) football to Europe for the first time, during a five-game exhibition tour in June 1977 between the Nite Hawks and the Chicago Lions of the Northern States AAA Pro Football League playing exhibition games in major European cities, including Paris, Lille, Frankfurt, Gratz and Vienna.
In the fall of 1977, he was hired away from the Nite Hawks to take over the reins of the struggling NSFL
Following that 2nd European venture, in the fall of 1979, Foster was hired by the NFL to become the promotion manager of NFL Properties, (marketing and licensing). During his tenure with the NFL (1979-82) he invented the game of arena football while watching the Major Indoor Soccer League All-Star game being played at Madison Square Garden[1] on February 11, 1981. He sketched out a diagram along with basic rules on the back of a 9" × 12" manila envelope.[1]
Foster opted to leave the NFL in September 1982 to pursue a goal of managing a major professional football team, taking an offer to help launch the Phoenix-based
When the fateful decision was later made to move the USFL in 1985 from a spring season to a fall season on a head-to-head basis with the NFL, Foster made a pivotal decision to begin working full-time on carefully testing and researching the mechanics and basic rules of the new game he had invented before actually launching the
In 1999 Foster co-founded and helped organize the AFL's developmental league,
In 1990, thanks to a lengthy, successful effort by well known Chicago-based intellectual properties attorney, William Niro, Foster was granted a US
Foster and his family, (Susan, Nile and Palmer) moved from Chicago to Des Moines in August 1994 and lived there from 1994 to 2002 while he operated the Iowa Barnstormers in the AFL through the 2000 season and then as an af2 team for the 2001 season. He also served on the
Jim Foster was inducted into the American Football Association's Minor Pro Football Hall of Fame in 1982, the
Personal life
His younger son Palmer, became a 3rd generation Iowa Hawkeye student-athlete, following in the footsteps of his grandfather Derrold (Pat) Foster (football, track and JV basketball and baseball 1945-1949), then by his father Jim. Palmer played Hawkeye football 2011-2013,(letter winner and honor student). After graduating from UIowa in 2014, Palmer was selected and received a post graduate academic-athletic scholarship to play and coach football with the Durham University Saints in Durham UK, 2014-2015 in the British University League while earning a Masters Degree at Durham. He then played one season of American pro level football in the Polish American Football league, followed by 6 seasons in the British Premiere American Football League, 2016-2019 and 2021-2022 where he earned multiple honors for his play as an outside linebacker.He also was selected after a multi step tryout process as a member of the Italian National American Football team in 2019 and played in two European Championship series games vs. the Swiss National team in Zurich and the Austrian National team in Vienna, (both wins).
See also
References
- ^ a b c Wallace, William N. (May 9, 1988). "Improvisation Lies at the Heart of Arena Football". The New York Times. Retrieved July 15, 2010.
- ^ "Blanchette .You Like Shock? Then Thank This Guy Saturday". The Spokesman-Review. May 26, 2006. Retrieved July 15, 2010.