Rose Parade Exhibit Marks a Route to America’s Past

Images of Kermit the Frog, President Richard Nixon and the Rev. Billy Graham--all former grand marshals--smile proudly from the walls. Meanwhile, television screens, perched on a mini-football field, flicker with films from gridiron games going back 70 years.

These are all part of a new Tournament of Roses exhibit, which is dedicated to the 110-year history of the parade and the 97-year history of the football game.

The show will open today in a tent near the Rose Bowl. The exhibit, which costs $4 for admission, is open to the public until Friday and available free to game-goers Saturday.

Rose Bowl organizers hope the artifacts on display eventually will be enshrined in their own permanent building, said Paul Kalil of BSN Productions, which helped organize the exhibit.

“The Rose Bowl mirrors the history of America,” said archeologist Allen Schery, hired to put the $200,000 project together in less than three months.

“It wasn’t just people walking around, watching a game,” he said. “It’s a window into our culture.”

In all, he has assembled about 80 trophies, 100 photographs, half a dozen dresses and other keepsakes from private owners and from items stored at the tournament’s Pasadena headquarters.

The artifacts show the history of the game and of the parade, which Schery said began in 1890 as a marketing ploy.

“It was a way of showing people on the East Coast how nice the weather out here is in the winter . . . so they would come out and buy houses,” he said.

Yet almost immediately, the parade’s floats and grand marshals began to showcase important political figures and highlight cultural trends, the exhibit shows. A 1912 photograph, taken after the Wright brothers’ success at Kitty Hawk, features the parade’s first airplane float.

Another photo is a portrait of Adm. William F. “Bull” Halsey, who, fresh off his battleship, rode a flowered float as the 1946 grand marshal.

The exhibit also demonstrates that, over the years, the floats and grand marshals have not always hit the mark. For instance, a 1920 float celebrated the advent of the electric car as the new means of transportation.

A photo caption explains that, in 1966, Walt Disney refused to appear on a float without characters Mickey, Donald and Goofy.

The game also is given full treatment, even when photos aren’t available. Written material describes the first match, held in 1902, when Michigan trounced Stanford, 49-0.

Several Stanford players suffered broken bones, enthusiasm waned, and football games were not resumed until 1916.

Instead, Rose parade organizers held chariot races, which are captured in several fading sepia photographs. Before the stadium was built, games and races were held at a nearby field.

Construction on the Rose Bowl was begun in 1921. One photograph depicts bulldozers ripping into the earth to start the two-year building project--a scene that drew the attention of today’s football committee Chairman Harriman L. Cronk. He noted the cost: $277,000.

He sighed. “I would like to lower the field,” he said. “But it would take millions just to do that.”

The idea for the museum came from Connie Campbell, Rose Bowl game manager, and Kevin Ash, director of game management. They wanted to make good use of a trove of football memorabilia in the tournament’s attic.

But Schery said he knows a lot of history has gotten away--like one of the Coleman trophies given to the best float years ago.

“Someone found that at a flea market,” he said, pointing to the shiny silver cup. “A lot of artifacts from the first 50 years are missing. . . . People didn’t know it was important.”

Museum organizers are hoping people who possess Rose Bowl memorabilia will come forward and lend it to the exhibit.

But in the meantime, said Schery, there is more than enough to please every kind of history buff--even those who don’t care a whit for football. For instance, there’s the wall of 8-by-10 glossies of past grand marshals such as Nixon, Graham, screen stars Mary Pickford and Jimmy Stewart, and baseball slugger Henry Aaron.

Then there the display case dedicated to Kermit, who was grand marshal in 1996. That year, the 12-inch puppet gave a 15-minute speech. The figure of Kermit is sitting up in the case, next to the custom-made red Rose Bowl jacket he wore on the occasion.

“Look at that,” said Schery, gesturing to a photograph of a dignified Rose Bowl official staring up at the green frog.

“He’s actually looking at Kermit with a straight face.”