For more than four decades, Jim Marshall and Billy Kilmer never talked about what happened Oct. 25, 1964, at San Francisco’s Kezar Stadium. That included nearly 15 more years of the two facing each other in the NFL.
Then at a charity golf outing a few years ago in Michigan, the two longtime stars found themselves sitting next to each other. Kilmer figured it was as good a time as any to bring it up.
“There were people in front of us waiting for autographs, and I told them while turning to Jim, ‘You know, we were part of a very famous event in pro football,’ ” Kilmer said.
That event turns 50 years old next Saturday. It has been named by NFL Films as the No. 1 folly in the history of the league.
With the Vikings playing at San Francisco, Kilmer, a running back in his early years with the 49ers before later becoming a Pro Bowl quarterback, took a pass from George Mira in the fourth quarter. He was hit and lost the ball while fighting for extra yardage.
Suddenly, Marshall, a legendary Minnesota defensive end, ran in and scooped up the fumble. Marshall had gotten turned around, and started running the wrong way.
Marshall didn’t stop until he had raced 66 yards into the wrong end zone. He then tossed the ball off the field, scoring a safety for the 49ers.
A dejected Marshall soon realized what he had done. The first player to reach him was San Francisco tackle Bruce Bosley, who patted him on the back.
Fortunately for the Vikings, they did not lose the game. The safety cut their lead to 27-19, but they held on to win 27-22.
A half-century later, some know Marshall more for that blunder than for lasting 20 NFL seasons while playing in 282 straight games. Hall of fame defensive end Carl Eller, another member of Minnesota’s famed “Purple People Eaters” line of the 1960s and ’70s, wonders if the play has played a role in keeping Marshall from joining him in Canton, Ohio.
“It was tough when it happened,” remembers Marshall, 76. “I took my football career very seriously and to make a mistake, of course, it’s something that you don’t want on your resume. But mistakes happen.
“Norm Van Brocklin (then Minnesota’s coach) was known to be tough on mistakes, but that didn’t cause us to lose the game. And he just said, ‘Hey, Jim, just forget about it.’ And that’s what I remember and that’s what I’ve been trying to do.”
Marshall, who lives in St. Louis Park and never misses a Vikings game on television, is reluctant to talk about the play. He’s willing to speak in generalities but didn’t want to go into specifics, saying it’s there for all to see on film.
Indeed, it is. Once NFL Films began publicizing follies in the late 1960s, it became a staple.
“As far as I’m concerned, it’s the all-time (folly),” said Fred Cox, then the Vikings’ kicker. “Who could conceive of a guy picking up the ball and running the wrong way?”
It actually had happened in the 1929 Rose Bowl, when California’s Roy Riegels grabbed a fumble in the second quarter and ran 69 yards in the wrong direction against Georgia Tech before his teammates stopped him at their 1. The Yellow Jackets soon got a safety for a 2-0 lead and won 8-7.
Riegels was called “Wrong Way” until he died in 1993. After Marshall’s blunder, he sent a note to the defensive end, which read, “Welcome to the club.”
Marshall’s play happened during what initially appeared to be a routine midseason game on a misty, 54-degree Sunday afternoon. Minnesota came in at 3-3 and San Francisco at 2-4 to Kezar Stadium, where the 49ers played until moving to Candlestick Park in 1971.
Marshall looked as if he was going to be one of the heroes of the game after hit Mira early in the fourth quarter and forced a fumble. Eller picked it up and ran 45 yards for a touchdown and a 27-17 lead.
The 49ers then tried to rally. From his own 9, Mira threw a pass to the 27 to Kilmer, who eluded defensive backs Karl Kassulke and George Rose for a few yards before being hit by Kassulke and linebacker Rip Hawkins while plowing to the 31.
“I thought I was down,” Kilmer said. “My forward motion was stopped and I thought they were going to blow the whistle and then Karl Kassulke came up and knocked the ball out of my hands.”
The ball rolled forward to the 49ers’ 34. Marshall, who had been trailing the play, scooped it up and didn’t break stride as he headed toward the wrong end zone.
“He wasn’t too far from me, and I’m standing there at first thinking, ‘I think he’s going to have a longer touchdown than mine,’ ” Eller said. “Then, all of a sudden, I realized that he was running the wrong way, but by that time it was too late for me to do anything.”
It also took linebacker Roy Winston an instant before he realized what was happening.
“After he picked up the ball, he was probably 20 yards from me,” Winston said. “I started going the other way trying to find somebody to block and then I looked back and I saw he was running the other way. It was just baffling to me.”
The 248-pound Marshall was known for his speed. So it wasn’t surprising that nobody came close to catching him.
“He was gaining on our guys trying to chase him,” said offensive tackle Grady Alderman. “It was the nuttiest thing I’d ever seen.”
Alderman was among many Minnesota players who ran down the sideline, begging for Marshall to turn around.
“I was like everybody else on the sideline,” said backup quarterback Ron Vander Kelen. “We were yelling, ‘You’re going the wrong way! You’re going the wrong way!’ ”
San Francisco announcer Bob Fouts was in the television booth along with his son, future hall of fame quarterback Dan Fouts, who was then 13 and doing stats. The play-by-play man had a hard time initially finding words.
“I was stunned and I was speechless at first,” said Bob Fouts. “Then I came to, and I yelled, ‘He’s going the wrong way.’ I just kept repeating that on the air.”
When Marshall reached his own end zone, he threw the ball in celebration onto a track that surrounded the field. That was the only good thing about the play for the Vikings since it resulted in just two points for the 49ers, rather than six.
“The big thing I remember is I hoped he dropped it in the end zone because Bruce Bosley was chasing him all the way,” Kilmer said. “I said, ‘If he drops it in the end zone, we get a touchdown.’ Instead, he was so happy that he threw the ball.”
Marshall wasn’t too happy after he turned around and Bosley was there congratulating him. The first Minnesota player to reach him was quarterback Fran Tarkenton, who confirmed to Marshall that he indeed had just scored a safety.
“Twitter would have blown up if they had it then,” Eller said.
Minnesota players consoled Marshall. The feisty Van Brocklin told him to wipe it out of his mind because the Vikings had to go right back out on defense after the free kick.
Eller recalls that for the rest of the game there was a “buzzing in the stadium that never settled down.” Fred Zamberletti, then the Vikings’ trainer and now the team’s historian, said it came from people talking and laughing about the bewildering event they had just seen.
“It was like nothing I’ve ever heard before in a stadium,” Zamberletti said. “It was like hearing a bunch of bees.”
After the safety, San Francisco’s Tommy Davis kicked a 47-yard field goal to cut the deficit to 27-22. But the Vikings were able to hold on, much to the relief of Marshall.
“There are a lot more pleasant memories about playing in the NFL than that particular play,” said Marshall, who played for Cleveland in 1960 and with the Vikings from 1961-79, never missing a game in his career. “There are a lot of mistakes made in games. That one just happened to be more visible than some of the others. But the name of the game is to win, and we did.”
For that reason, Minnesota players eventually were able to joke with Marshall about his blunder. When they returned to practice after flying home from San Francisco, it was the big topic.
“Everybody was on him,” said Winston, who cracked that, because of Marshall’s play, nobody remembers he had three interceptions that day against the 49ers. “The press was on him. People were calling him ‘Wrong Way Marshall’ and things like that.”
Marshall was said to have taken it well.
“Everybody was giving him the raspberries,” Cox said. “Jim, it didn’t bother him. He was laughing right along with us. After that, he really used it as promotional thing for himself.”
Marshall even agreed to go on “I’ve Got a Secret,” for an episode that ran Nov. 9, 1964, on CBS. On the television show, hosted by Steve Allen, panelists tried to guess a contestant’s secret, as if it was anything Marshall could hide.
Panelist Henry Morgan, a comedian who obviously recognized Marshall, asked if what he did appeared in the papers, and he said it did. Then Morgan asked the defensive end if it was “listed under disaster.” Marshall laughed and said, “Possibly.”
“I probably talked about it every day for two or three years after it happened,” Marshall said.
As the years went on, there were fewer questions about the play. But when it did come up, Marshall had grown weary of discussing it, saying his preference has been to forget about it.
“It’s ironic,” Eller said. “It’s one of the most memorable plays, but I think it detracts from Jim and from his career. And I think he’s still sensitive about it. I’m very respectful of that for him. I think it’s unfortunate that it happened to Jim because he was such an outstanding player.”
Eller, who continues to live in the Twin Cities, never mentions the play when he sees Marshall. But that didn’t stop Kilmer from bringing it up a few years ago to Marshall.
Kilmer went on to play quarterback for New Orleans and Washington through 1978, leading the Redskins to the Super Bowl after the 1972 season. His teams faced Marshall’s Vikings nine more times, including two playoff games, but they never once talked about the famous play.
Then Kilmer was seated next to Marshall at a Gridiron Greats event a few years ago in Michigan.
“We talked a little bit about (the play), but he really didn’t want to talk a lot about it,” said Kilmer, now retired in South Florida.
Marshall shrugged off having talked to Kilmer then. Kilmer said he at least was able to get Marshall to laugh when he made one quip about that famous moment on Oct. 25, 1964.
“I told him, ‘You know, Jim, we’re in the Hall of Fame every day,’ ” Kilmer said. “They play that sequence in the Hall of Fame. At least we made the Hall of Fame there.”
Follow Chris Tomasson at twitter.com/christomasson.
