Football's shrine

By PETER JENSEN
BALTIMORE SUN
CANTON -- One by one, the people wander slowly through enshrinement hall and instinctively whisper the names of the former greats, as if to give homage.
Sammy Baugh. Joe Schmidt. Bronko Nagurski.
Row after row of life-size bronze busts pay no heed. A narrow spotlight shines down on each -- men captured forever young and clear-eyed, determined and tough, in cold, hard metal.
It's hard not to feel a little bit awed at the Pro Football Hall of Fame in Canton.
It was a little past noon when we arrived in Canton, and we headed straight for the Pro Football Hall of Fame. It was easy enough to find. The entrance is just off Interstate 77, and when I say, "just off," I'm talking about maybe 100 yards.
I had seen photos of the entrance with its trademark ovoid roof seemingly stuck halfway into a circular rotunda like a football on a tee. (Hall regulars prefer to describe this shape as orange juicer architecture).
Opened in 1963, the hall has expanded three times to its current 83,000 square feet -- about the size of 1 1/2 football fields -- or, basically, a Wal-Mart.
Admission is $12 for adults, $6 for children. Plan to spend at least two hours here and preferably three.
Your first stop must certainly be the rotunda, the circular building you first enter. Its exhibits trace the history of football from its earliest days in western Pennsylvania to the first pro league, which was located in Canton (and thus explains that "Why Canton?" question that hall officials are always hearing).
The late Baltimore Colts quarterback Johnny Unitas gets his due here. A display lists his 47 consecutive games with at least one touchdown pass alongside an impossibly white No. 19 uniform and a picture of the man with the golden arm at the height of his success.
The older, the better
But the best stuff is from even earlier. The first examples of shoulder and hip pads, cleats and wool uniforms look like ancient relics.
They even have a 1920s-era uniform worn by Jim Thorpe when he played for the Canton Bulldogs, the local pro team back when football was mostly a college game and not the national obsession it is today.
With that accomplished, you must now head straight to the hall's most popular exhibit, GameDay Stadium, where you watch a movie about the NFL.
Not to give too much away, but the entire theater is built on a turntable, and at a critical point in the movie, you get turned to a much bigger, louder presentation.
Our kids, age 3 and 6, loved it. And who wouldn't? Most of the film is shot in eye-popping 35mm film and presented in wraparound Cinemascope. You feel like you're on the field with the players.
In good voice
And the film is narrated by that familiar voice of NFL Films, the late John Facenda, whose baritone voice could pass for God's.
(Facenda's mellifluous tones are so omnipresent in the hall, the only thing lacking is a burning bush to complete the effect.)
The building's other highlights are numerous: enshrinement hall with its 216 life-size busts, the Super Bowl experience with exhibits from the 36 championship games, the mementos room with helmets, cleats, uniforms and even former Commissioner Bert Bell's desk.
The Pro Football Hall of Fame is more garish, more commercial (Visa sponsors a fan tribute area), louder and less poetic and contemplative than baseball's version, but doesn't that reflect the nature of the sport? In this, I think the hall's creators were quite smart. Not subtle, but smart.
You won't find much controversy here. Though the hall is a private, nonprofit organization, the NFL is its major sponsor, and you won't see a lot about drug testing, labor contracts, steroids and gambling.
Like many other tourist attractions, the hall did lousy business last year, about 165,000 visitors, the lowest attendance since 1985. Admissions are up 10 percent this year, according to spokesman Joe Horrigan.
Peak times are in midsummer when the hall enshrines its new members and the NFL kicks off its preseason in the adjoining 24,000-seat stadium. Don't worry about crowds during the remainder of the year.
Still, we were surprised the place wasn't busier. But we had fun, including the non-football-loving members of the family, which would be pretty much everyone but me.