PEOPLE look at you as if you’re crazy when you say you’re not a Dallas Cowboys fan.

However, since this is the 50th anniversary year of the founding of the American Football League, perhaps the time is right to tell the story of why there are a few diehards who won’t root for what often has been called “America’s Team.”

Both Houston and Dallas were ready for pro football in the late 1950s, but were continuously denied by the National Football League. The two AFL founders — Lamar Hunt of Dallas and Bud Adams of Houston — had each tried unsuccessfully to buy existing NFL franchises.

So, Hunt and Adams got together and decided to start a new league. The first two announced franchises were, of course, in Dallas and Houston. Two weeks later they revealed franchise grants to New York, Los Angeles, Denver and Minneapolis. Boston and Buffalo were added in short order. Minneapolis backed out to get a NFL team and was replaced by Oakland. Each franchise put up $25,000 to become part of the AFL.

NFL powers-that-be (mostly Chicago’s George Halas and Pittsburgh’s Art Rooney) decided Houston and Dallas really were ready for pro football after all and designated them for franchise expansion. However, they decided instead to replace Houston with Minneapolis. Dallas, where Hunt had the Texans, became the principal battleground in the war.

That began a very costly battle for talent. LSU’s Billy Cannon was the first big name target for both leagues. Houston’s Adams won the contest for Cannon, doubling the NFL’s $50,000 offer to the running back. Adams picked up Cannon in Baton Rouge in his wife’s brand new Cadillac convertible and drove him to Houston for dinner at his home. Cannon told the Oilers’ owner that his hard-working, blue-collar dad had always wanted a Cadillac. Adams gave his wife’s convertible to Cannon before dinner and the Number 1 draft choice of both leagues immediately drove back to Baton Rouge to deliver it to his father.

ADAMS’ OILERS won the first two AFL championships in 1960 and 1961 before losing the 1962 title game to the Dallas Texans in double overtime.

When the announcement of the AFL formation took place in 1959, I was a night-class student at the University of Houston. My sports yen was great and I rejoiced with thousands of others at the coming of pro football to Houston. At UH, I worked in the press box at Cougar football games to supplement my income. My boss in that job was UH sports information director Jack Scott, who was chosen to direct similar operations for the Houston Oilers. So, I worked the AFL’s 1960 inaugural season in the Oilers’ press box.

Spending a great deal of my life in or around Houston quite naturally made me a fan of just about every sport — pro, college or high school — in the area.

Admittedly, the Dallas Cowboys put together a great pro football franchise. Clint Murchison was one of the very best owners ever. Tom Landry, a football coaching genius, was one of the classiest guys of all time.

NFL MINIONS saw to it that the Cowboys organization got lots of help in winning the Dallas market. That excelled to the extent that AFL co-founder Hunt and his Texans moved to Kansas City and became the Chiefs after the 1962 season.

The combining of the two leagues was announced in 1966 and the first common draft occurred in 1967. Full merger came in 1970.

Of course, Adams got a little horsey in Houston and demanded a world-class stadium. Houston leadership and fans denied him and he moved to his team to Tennessee. Now Houston has another NFL team, ironically named the Texans.

So, I root for the Texans and, most of the time, for old AFL teams playing old NFL teams.

And, if I need another reason than the 1960s pro football war not to yell for Dallas, then Cowboys owner Jerry Jones gives me ample excuse.

Oh, okay, if they’re playing against some team other than Houston or an old AFL team, I’ll watch and pull for them…sort of.

Willis Webb is a retired community newspaper editor-publisher. He can be reached by email at wwebb@wildblue.net.