Podcast Summary:

Podcast: New Books Network
Episode: David Fleming, "A Big Mess in Texas: The Miraculous, Disastrous 1952 Dallas Texans and the Craziest Untold Story in NFL History"
Host: Keith Rathbone
Guest: David Fleming
Date: December 21, 2025

Episode Overview

This episode of New Books in Sports (a channel of the New Books Network) features host Keith Rathbone in conversation with journalist and author David Fleming. The focus is Fleming’s new book "A Big Mess in Texas: The Miraculous, Disastrous 1952 Dallas Texans and the Craziest Untold Story in NFL History."
The episode explores the wild, almost unbelievable story of the Dallas Texans: a short-lived, failed NFL franchise, whose collapse encapsulated the chaotic, pre-television era of the league and whose story touches on southern patriarchy, race relations, financial calamity, and a whole lot of off-field antics. Fleming and Rathbone discuss how this forgotten episode reveals much about the NFL’s evolution, American culture in the 1950s, and why remembering the Texans matters today.

1. How the Story Was Discovered

(03:31–05:41)

• Fleming discovered the tale of the Texans while researching the worst teams in NFL history after the 2017 Cleveland Browns’ 0-16 season.
• Despite years covering strange, "stranger than fiction" sports stories, even he had never heard of the 1952 Dallas Texans.
• Fleming emphasizes, “All the best stories are the ones that you just stumble upon accidentally.” (05:07, David Fleming)

2. Why the Texans Were Unique: More Than Just a Bad Team

(06:19–07:29)

• The book is not just a chronicle of on-field futility.
• The Texans’ tale is about a clash of progressive ideals, race, southern tradition, financial naiveté, and outrageous behavior, all set against a rapidly changing postwar America.
• “It’s really about the set of circumstances in which the team can emerge, can rise so dramatically and fall so dramatically.” (06:28, Keith Rathbone)

3. The NFL in the 1950s: Chaos Before Corporatism

(09:36–12:42)

• The pre-TV NFL was nothing like today’s corporate colossus; the league was perpetually teetering on bankruptcy.
• “31 of the first 43 NFL franchises went bankrupt…the Texans were the last team to go bankrupt.” (10:10, David Fleming)
• The league depended almost solely on gate receipts and cycled through new owners to pay old debts, operating “essentially as a Ponzi scheme.” (10:15–10:30, David Fleming)
• The influx of WWII veterans made for a wild league with little seriousness and plenty of color: “They just didn’t take themselves too seriously…and maybe they embodied it a little too much.” (11:30, David Fleming)

4. Giles Miller and the People Behind the Team

(13:00–17:37)

• Giles Miller, the 31-year-old son of the “Textile King of the South,” became the team’s face and unwitting tragicomic hero.
• Miller was wealthy, ambitious, but completely naïve about pro football—relying on his father’s money and a relentless, booming-voiced NFL commissioner, Bert Bell.
• “Sometimes he was an amazing person who was very progressive and ahead of his time, and other times, he was just completely clueless to a dangerous degree.” (18:00, David Fleming)
• Miller’s daily routine included being berated by Bert Bell by phone: “Bert, why don’t you just open your window and yell at me, and I’m sure I’ll be able to hear you here down in Texas.” (17:45, Giles Miller via D. Fleming)

5. Dallas: Not Ready for the Texans

(19:45–24:10)

• Despite Dallas’s football obsession, resistance to an integrated team was overwhelming.
• The 1952 Texans fielded two star black players, making them the first integrated sports team in Texas, despite the city being “the epicenter of the Ku Klux Klan and…strictly and violently segregated in the 1950s.” (20:33–20:54, David Fleming)
• “That doomed the team almost from the get go.” (21:45, David Fleming)

6. Race, Representation, and Local Backlash

(24:10–26:05)

• Miller justified his progressive roster, saying, “I have to be able to look Earl [his family’s black butler] in the eyes. And so we are going to put the best players on the field, regardless of race or creed or religion.” (23:01, David Fleming)
• The city—and Miller’s own friends—recoiled and the team became a pariah, as seen in violent threats and bombings against black players’ homes.
• Player George Taliaferro was forced to live in a bombed, segregated district: “He had to live in South Dallas…in a place where there had been 12 unsolved house bombings by the KKK.” (24:36, David Fleming)

7. Hilarious (and Harrowing) Highlights: Training Camp Antics

(26:05–31:18)

• The team held camp in the hottest Texas town (up to 120°F); their equipment man had never seen a football and soaked all gear with water to “cool players down,” resulting in soggy chaos.
• Players dodged rattlesnakes, wore mismatched, wet uniforms, and frequently avoided practice for beer, fishing, and impromptu volleyball tournaments.
• “The most exercise the Texans ever got was on Fridays. They would all run together to the banks to make sure that their checks didn't bounce.” (30:16, David Fleming)

8. Coaching Misadventures: Jimmy Phelan

(29:01–30:23)

• Legendary and infamously unserious coach Jimmy Phelan, a former Notre Dame quarterback, “hated practice more than the players did.” He preferred racing forms and flask over drills.
• “Jimmy Fallon [Phelan] explained the Texans playbook to a new quarterback…they said it took a half hour…and they said, oh, he went over it twice.” (29:41, David Fleming)

9. From Bad Team to Broken Franchise

(31:18–35:49)

• Despite talented players (over a dozen future Hall of Famers and legends), lack of preparation, poor play, and social backlash ensured poor ticket sales.
• Games at the enormous Cotton Bowl were played to nearly empty stands, quickly draining Miller’s finances.
• Within five months, Miller “had to basically turn the team back over to the NFL.” (34:40, David Fleming)

10. The Orphan Team: On the Road to Nowhere

(35:06–37:18)

• The NFL took over and relocated the team to Hershey, PA, turning them into a homeless barnstorming squad.
• The team drowned their sorrows, “drinking Hershey dry,” with legendary partiers like Chubby Grigg (who raced teammates in drinking 17 grasshopper shots).
• “The Texans picked the one dry county in Texas to hold their training camp…and so they spent a lot of effort trying to hide and sneak in all the alcohol and booze.” (28:00, David Fleming)

11. Rock Bottom and Redemption: The Thanksgiving Miracle

(37:18–42:26)

• After being humiliated and abandoned, the Texans beat George Halas's Chicago Bears on Thanksgiving in Akron, Ohio in what contemporaries called “the greatest upset in NFL history.”
• Only 500 fans attended; coach Phelan told his players to thank each one personally.
• The Bears, fielding backups out of contempt, “insulted” the Texans, which sparked the players’ fiery, united performance.
• “In one magical afternoon…they actually end up beating the Chicago Bears on Thanksgiving.” (40:41, David Fleming)

12. Why This Lost Team Matters: Legacy and Lessons

(43:18–47:36)

• The book closes by tracing the "afterlives" of the Texans:
  • The franchise moved and became the iconic Baltimore Colts.
  • Uniforms, colors, and even traditions were essentially stolen by the Cowboys.
  • Their racial and social innovations—integrated rosters, female ownership—were virtually erased from local history.
• “The savior of the NFL started out as this incredible disaster in Texas.” (44:33, David Fleming)
• “They were just a couple years ahead of their time.” (47:01, David Fleming)

13. The Unrecognized Pioneers: George Taliaferro

(47:36–49:28)

• Fleming highlights Taliaferro as “the Jackie Robinson of the NFL,” yet, unlike Robinson, Taliaferro has not been enshrined in Canton.
• “He’s referred to…as the Jackie Robinson of the NFL…he deserves to be remembered.” (48:18, David Fleming)

14. Final Thoughts and Upcoming Work

(49:58–50:59)

• Fleming teases his next project, based on his Peabody-nominated journalism: the role of sports among death row inmates in Texas, exploring how sports maintain humanity and social connection in extreme isolation.

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• “All the best stories are the ones that you just stumble upon accidentally.” (05:07, David Fleming)
• “31 of the first 43 NFL franchises went bankrupt.” (10:10, David Fleming)
• “I have to be able to look Earl in the eyes, and so we are going to put the best players on the field, regardless of race or creed or religion.” (23:01, David Fleming on Giles Miller)
• “The most exercise the Texans ever got was on Fridays. They would all run together to the banks to make sure that their checks didn't bounce.” (30:16, David Fleming)
• “In one magical afternoon…the Texans actually end up beating the Chicago Bears on Thanksgiving…called the greatest upset in NFL history.” (40:41, David Fleming)
• “The savior of the NFL started out as this incredible disaster in Texas.” (44:33, David Fleming)

Essential Timestamps

| Timestamp | Segment / Topic | |-----------|-------------------------------------------------------------| | 03:31 | Discovery of the Texans story | | 06:19 | Not just a “bad team” – larger social and cultural forces | | 09:36 | The chaotic, pre-TV era NFL | | 13:00 | Characters: Giles Miller and the NFL powers | | 19:45 | Race and why Dallas rejected the Texans | | 26:05 | Training camp fiascos | | 29:01 | Coach Jimmy Phelan’s comic mishaps | | 31:18 | Empty stadiums and financial collapse | | 35:06 | NFL takeover and Hershey barnstorming | | 37:18 | The Thanksgiving Miracle upset over the Bears | | 43:18 | Legacy: Baltimore Colts, Cowboys, lasting impact | | 47:36 | George Taliaferro and the overlooked integration story | | 49:58 | Fleming’s next project on sports and death row in Texas |

Tone and Style

The episode balances sharp, journalistic investigation (in Fleming’s and Rathbone’s analysis) with irreverent anecdotes and a darkly comedic tone, reflecting the absurdity and tragedy of the Texans’ story. Fleming’s writing—“stranger than fiction” sports tales—carries over into a conversation that is by turns funny, poignant, and deeply insightful about sports and society.

Why Listen or Read the Book?

• Discover a hidden, essential chapter in NFL and Dallas history.
• Understand how sports can embody and expose the contradictions in American society, particularly regarding race and social progress.
• Enjoy wild, laugh-out-loud stories of sporting failure, resilience, and unintended legacy.
• Appreciate a cast of characters that feel both larger than life and deeply human.

For anyone interested in sports, history, American culture, or just a great untold story, both this episode and Fleming's book are essential, thought-provoking, and entertaining.