Dang, I meant to post this yesterday... Marine Capt. Joe Foss, a fighter ace who received the Medal of Honor was the reason there's a Super Bowl

Foss receives the Congressional Medal of Honor from President Franklin D. Roosevelt in this 1943 photo as his mother, left, and wife look on.

Foss was hooked on becoming a pilot at a very early age, so determined to fulfill his goal that he hitchhiked 300 miles in 1940 to enlist in the Marine Corps Reserve and enroll in the Naval Aviation Cadet program.

He shot down 23 enemy aircraft during a prolific six-week period in the fall of 1942, and three Japanese planes in January 1943.

Covering 60 missions, his squadron -- nicknamed Foss' Flying Circus -- was credited with 72 confirmed kills, with an impressive 26 attributed to its fearless leader.

 in December 1963, Foss - then the commissioner of the upstart American Football League - sent a letter to his NFL counterpart, Pete Rozelle, to suggest a matchup between the leagues’ respective champions.

"The establishment of a World Series of professional football is necessary to the continued progress of our game if we're to be true sportsmen and not merely businessmen in sports," Foss wrote in his seven-paragraph letter. "Pro football has now attained the status where many regard it as our national sport. What could be more fitting then than for us to match baseball in having an annual classic between the leagues."

Foss’s influence over the birth of the Super Bowl is undeniable. While he was not the only AFL official calling for a championship game against the more established NFL, the leagues were only two months from a merger and less than a year before Vince Lombardi's Green Bay Packers cruised to victory in the first Super Bowl by the time he stepped down as AFL commissioner in 1966.

https://www.military.com/off-duty/wwii-fighter-ace-and-medal-of-honor-recipient-who-helped-give-america-super-bowl.html