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The first ever Lions game at Tigers Stadium, then known as Briggs Stadium, takes place against the then NFL defending Champs, the Washington Redskins.
A sold out crowd of 42,855 saw their faithful Lions put up a valiant struggle, only to fall short to the Redskins by a 7-5 score. The home team jumped to a 5-0 lead on a Regis Monahan field goal. On the ensuing kickoff Redskins returner Andy Farkas took the ball from behind his own goal line and returned it three yards before retreating and getting tackled in the end zone for a Detroit safety.
But Farkas, a former University of Detroit star, would get redemption against his former home team scoring the go ahead touchdown early in the third quarter after teammate Wee Willie Wilkin blocked a punt, giving the Redskins a 7-5 lead and eventual victory.
While the Lions might have been the first NFL team to play in Tiger Stadium, they were not the first professional football team to do so. That honor went to the AFPA’s Detroit Heralds in 1920, and who even played at then Navin Field before then. But pro football had a strong history with Tiger Stadium as the Lions played there up to 1975, after which they would move to the newly built Pontiac Silverdome.
Special thanks to Ron Flatter for helping ID the photo.
2nd graf, 2nd line: change “5-0” to “3-0”. The score only became 5-0 after the subsequent safety.
4th graf, 2nd line: the 1920 team’s name was the Detroit “Heralds”.
Thanks for the look-back at a forgotten part of Michigan football history. I fondly remember those old Lions games at Briggs/Tiger Stadium. Most memorable: Their 1962 Thanksgiving Day wipeout of the Packers.
Thanks…made the corrections.