There was an organizational meeting for the American Football League held at the Pick-Nicollet Hotel in downtown Minneapolis in November 1959. Minnesota was scheduled to receive one of the eight franchises in the new league.
At the last moment, the Minneapolis group pulled out in order to pursue an expansion franchise in the National Football League.
The AFL then awarded the eighth franchise to Oakland. That team took the name "Raiders" and started play in 1960. A year later, the Minnesota Vikings became the NFL's 14th team.
The merger of the AFL and the NFL was completed in 1970. Since then, the Raiders and the Vikings have played 13 games -- with No. 14 scheduled for Sunday at the Metrodome.
The second of those games was played on Jan. 9, 1977, and it holds a monumental place in Vikings history. It was the 11th Super Bowl and the first pro football game to be played in the Rose Bowl.
On that morning, the Minneapolis Tribune's Sid Hartman passed along some optimistic words from Grady Alderman. He was a starting tackle on Vikings teams that had lost Super Bowls after the 1969, 1973 and 1974 seasons.
Alderman was retired and serving as the analyst on Vikings radio. Certainly, his words made for sweet prose to Sid's readers.
"The attitude of the Vikings is much different now than in the first three Super Bowls," Alderman said. "They believe to a man they can beat Oakland. They are sure they are a better team. This wasn't the situation in the previous Super Bowls.