The Goodyear Blimp became the first non-player or coach inducted into the Chick-fil-A College Football Hall of Fame, and every fan should go check out the blimp exhibit.
The College Football Hall of Fame has tapped the Goodyear Blimp, making it an honorary member and the first non-player or coach to be part of the hall.
It’s a floating icon, a brand-name dirigible that long ago moved past its status of clever product advertising to become ensconced in the lexicon of pop culture in America, and more importantly, in sports culture.
If you were attending or viewing a sporting event in the last 65 years and saw the Goodyear Blimp drift overhead, sending back breathtaking aerial views of the stadium and surrounding city, you knew it was a big game.
Beginning with the Tournament of Roses Parade in 1955, the Goodyear Blimp has been a part of college sports in America. Per Goodyear, the Blimp has covered over 2,000 sports and entertainment events and has also achieved several major television “firsts” along the way, including being the first to provide aerial coverage of a major sports event and the first to deliver high definition live video from an aerial platform to a national sports game.
As part of its induction into the College Football Hall of Fame, an interactive exhibit has been created to give fans a closer look into this institution of sports television programming.
The exhibit — which opens to the public on December 13, 2019 — is designed to recreate the inside of the blimp’s gondola, and short of actually flying the blimp inside the College Football Hall of Fame for visitors to see, it’s as close as you can possibly get to the real thing.
Sit in the pilot’s seat, do your own camera shots, even create a custom message that would be seen on the outside of an actual blimp, and learn about the history of America’s most famous aerial transport as part of your visit to the Hall of Fame and the Goodyear Blimp exhibit.
ESPN analyst Kirk Herbstreit was on hand for the ribbon-cutting ceremony for the Goodyear Blimp exhibit and shared his memories about the honoree.
"“I’ve had an interesting view, probably like a lot of you, growing up as a kid and going to a college football game, you look up and you see the blimp and you know it’s a big game. You know it’s on national TV.“I did that at Ohio State for a number of years, and then I became a player. I was at Ohio State, played big games — sometimes the blimp wouldn’t be up there, and you knew it wasn’t a big game (chuckles) — and then you play Michigan or one of the nationally televised games and it was really cool to know that you were playing the game of the week and that a lot of eyes were going to be on you.“Then I moved into my next chapter of life and became a broadcaster, and ended up calling the ABC Saturday night game, and the blimp, again, was in my life.”"
“Goodyear is honored to showcase this exhibit, which is emblematic of our more driven approach to everything we do,” stated Todd Macsuga, Goodyear’s general manager of Brand Marketing. “We take great pride in being a leader of firsts, and the blimp’s presence in college football has allowed us to be a leader in this area, bringing fans closer than ever to the sport. We look forward to driving innovation in aerial coverage for years to come.”
A few fun facts about the Goodyear Blimp:
- The Goodyear Blimp base located near Akron, Ohio is the oldest airship base in the United States.
- Pilgrim was the first Goodyear Blimp to be used for public relations and was decorated each December for Goodyear’s “Santa Claus Express” program.
- In 1930 the Goodyear Blimp Defender became the first airship in the world to carry the now-famous lighted sign.
- Charles Lindbergh enjoyed a pleasure-ride in the Volunteer, Goodyear’s Blimp based in Los Angeles, two years after his famous transatlantic flight.
- The Goodyear Blimp Columbia provided live aerial views and coverage of Super Bowl I between the Green Bay Packers and Kansas City Chiefs.
- The Columbia also took part in an event many sports fans may remember on October 17, 1989. A 6.9 earthquake hit the California Bay Area, and the Blimp was asked by authorities to assist with emergency relief by providing aerial views of the damage and to help determine where emergency services were needed most.
To have the Goodyear Blimp honored in this way is not only special but important. So many of the famous images fans have enjoyed for decades have been provided by the Blimp, and without them, we would never have seen certain views or had vistas that would be indelibly marked in the history of college football.
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