Showing your support for your favorite professional sports team by wearing apparel emblazoned with their logo is pretty easy nowadays, if you have deep pockets. Websites such as Fanatics.com carry an incredible variety of top quality merchandise – jackets, sweatshirts, caps, etc. – for all of the leagues, all available at your fingertips with a few clicks.
(I've bought a few Toronto Maple Leaf items on Fanatics.com over the years, so I'm all set to blend in with the crowd in Toronto when they eventually win the Stanley Cup.)
But finding and buying stuff with a team logo on it wasn't always so easy fifty years ago. It used to be that only certain area stores might carry a team's line of merchandise.
Sears was one of those stores, selling officially licensed Cleveland Browns apparel. The ad below ran in the Lorain Journal back on October 11, 1973.
I remember seeing kids wear the hats and jackets shown in the ad. But while my brothers and I liked the Cleveland Indians (and went to some games), I don't remember us being big Browns fans as kids. In fact, I've never bought a Browns cap or T-shirt in my life.
Anyway, the Sears ad is kind of neat in that it features nine Cleveland Browns who were scheduled to make personal appearances at various Sears stores: Walter Johnson, John Demarie, Sandusky's Thom Darden; Jerry Sherk (at the Midway Mall store); Milt Morin, Billy Andrews, Don Cockroft, Bob DeMarco and Charlie Hall.
One thing comes to mind when I see that list. Why did they send Thom Darden to Southgate, instead of a store in Sandusky – his hometown?
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I still remember those unfunny commercials for Southgate USA starring actor Ted Knight.
