IF there’s one word to describe the Steelers 28-27 win over the Washington Commanders that word is “energizing.”
The Commanders haven’t reached “contender” status yet, but they are one of the NFL’s hottest teams. The Steelers suffered from self-inflicted wounds on special teams, offense and defense, but “the collective,” as Mike Tomlin likes to call it, never blinked.
But one of the most moving moments happened off the field, just seconds before Jayden Daniels tried to hit Noah Brown on third and 9 only to have James Pierre deflect the pass:
Yes, Myron Cope would be proud and rightfully so.
An onlooker who was only listening or perhaps just viewing the action in the stands could be forgiven if they concluded they were in Pittsburgh, not Landover, Maryland.
What made this special wasn’t the fact that Steelers Nation had taken over yet another opponent’s stadium. No, the Washington Commanders had expected that. Not only did they expect that, but they tried to counter the force of the Terrible Towel by giving away free burgundy and gold towels, complete with instructions, to their fans detailing how and when to wave it.
This isn’t the first time another NFL franchise has tried to copy the Terrible Towel, nor is it likely to be the last. If memory serves, the Jaguars and perhaps the Ravens tried something similar in the 1990s, and the Vikings gave our towels to their fans in London in 2013.
- All of those efforts failed in the past, just as future attempts will fail in the future.
The reason is that while the Terrible Towel is something that Steelers fans have physically purchased, the spirit that the Terrible Towel embodies isn’t something that can be bought, fabricated or commercially reproduced.
A simple story reveals why.
On evening of Tuesday October, 4th 1994 after almost 82 years, Pittsburgh said goodbye to Joseph Michael Patrick Daugherty who was my grandfather. My parents were with him, and on her way out of the South Side Hospital, my mother made a stop.
- She stepped into the gift shop and bought my first Terrible Towel.
I was 22 at the time, and although my brother and I had wanted Terrible Towels during the glory years of the Super Steelers, they were too expensive. Grandpa Joe wasn’t much of a Steelers fans, but my mom knew I’d always wanted a Terrible Towel.
So she took advantage of the occasion and bought me one as she explains in her own words:
I came down to the lobby of the hospital after Grandpa died and saw that Terrible Towel in the gift shop. I didn’t pause a second, went right in and bought it, figuring this is something good, constructive, and that Grandpa would approve of. And you would like it, especially bc it was inspired by grandpa. I was right.
That was my first Terrible Towel and today it remains one of my most prized possessions.
That point isn’t that every Steelers fan has a similar story about their Terrible Towel. The point is that the Terrible Towel occupies such an critical part of the Steelers Nation ecosystem that every has the possibility of having a similar story or experience.
Myron Cope invented the Terrible Towel at the end of the Steelers 1975 season as WTAE manager Ted J. Atkins was looking for a gimmick. Cope and station management settled on Towels thinking that black or gold towels were something that every fan owned.
Yancey Thigpen twirls the Terrible Towel.
Myron Cope promoted the idea on the air, and on December 27th 1975, the Terrible Towel was born during the Steelers 28-10 win over the Baltimore Colts in the AFC Divisional playoff game.
- Decades before the digital age invented the term, Myron Cope had crowd-sourced a talisman.
Since then the Terrible Towel has gone viral. And, as marketers like to say, the Terrible Towel’s growth has been organic. It has made its way to Ireland’s Cliffs of Moher, the Inca Trail in Peru, the South Pole, Mt. Everest, F-15 flying over the mountains of Afghanistan, the Great Wall of China, the International Space Station and everywhere in between.
While Myron Cope licensed the Terrible Towel to the Steelers in 1996, he did so on the condition that all proceeds go to the Merakey Allegheny Valley School (AVS), a school for the developmentally disabled.
- The Terrible Towel is a universal symbol that identifies Steelers fans and that Steelers fans identify with.
Other teams have their own unique talismans, some more successful than others (think the Green Bays Packers Cheese Heads), but the Terrible Towel will always remain the property of Pittsburgh.
The other 31 NFL franchises would do well to take that lesson to heart.
