From a Dallas Cowboys local rival in Texas to Missouri

TODAY we know the Kansas City Chiefs as perennial Super Bowl contenders, but what did they look like when they were first founded.

Before the Chiefs ever existed, there was one man who had a dream that shaped the landscape of the NFL as we know it today.

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Lamar Hunt (left) founder of the Kansas City ChiefsCredit: Getty

The Chiefs celebrate a Super Bowl victory in Las Vegas, Nevada, led by quarterback Patrick MahomesCredit: Getty

In 1959, a businessman known as Lamar Hunt had an idea. He wanted to build a new professional football league to rival the NFL.

That dream would come to fruition in the form of the American Football League, and the Dallas Texans were born in 1960.

Of course, the Texans we know today are based in Houston, but these Texans would go on to become the Chiefs in a few short years.

The Dallas Texans didn’t look all that much different from the team they would transform into.

They wore red jerseys with white letters outlined in gold, white pants, and red and gold socks.

The Texans also wore alternate white jerseys with red numbers outlined in gold, white pants, and red and gold socks.

The team’s iconic red helmets were simply adorned with a white silhouette of the state of Texas.

Dallas’ logo featured that same silhouette, except in red, with a cowboy holding a football and a pistol with the name Texans across his chest.

The Texans spent three years in Dallas, competing for fans with the Cowboys.

Hunt was swayed into moving the team to Kansas City by mayor Harold Roe Bartle.

He promised increased season-ticket sales and expanded seating at the Municipal Stadium.

The Texans were never meant to be renamed to the Chiefs, but Bartle insisted the team be named after himself.

He was nicknamed “Chief Lone Bear” for his role in the Kansas City Boy Scout councils, and eventually the name “Chief” stuck with people in town.

Jack Spike, running back for the Dallas TexansCredit: Getty

Head coach Hank Stram looks on from the sidelines of a mid 1960s Chiefs gameCredit: Getty

So, while the team has long used Native American imagery in its theming, it was actually named after the city’s mayor at the time.

Starting in 1963, the Chiefs competed in the AFL and adopted two new logos. The first emulated the old Texans logo, but instead used the outlines of Arkansas, Iowa, Kansas, Missouri, Nebraska, and Oklahoma as its silhouette. Across the front of the silhouette was a Native American chief holding a football and a tomahawk.

The second logo the Chiefs adopted in 1963 is the one we recognize today. A white arrowhead with the letters KC in red adorned across the center of it.

Hunt also brought the Dallas Texans’ uniforms to Kansas City, and simply swapped out the old Texas silhouette on their helmets in favor of the arrowhead logo.

While Hunt brought those uniforms to Kansas City, the Chiefs very nearly looked much different from how we know them today.

When the team was first being established, Hunt wanted the color scheme to be Columbia blue and orange.

However, Bud Adams — the founder of the Oilers — chose Columbia blue and scarlet for his team’s uniforms, so Hunt reverted to the red and gold we see on the field today.

The Chiefs’ first three seasons weren’t perfect, with the team going just 19-19-4 from 1963-1965.

And while the team was working on becoming a contender in Kansas City, Hunt was working on another project in the background.

Stram celebrates winning the Super Bowl with the Chiefs in 1970Credit: Getty

He was a central figure in the negotiations with NFL commissioner Pete Rozelle to agree on an AFL-NFL merger, and officials from both leagues agreed to hold a combined league championship game at the end of the 1966 season. That would end up being the first Super Bowl.

Immediately after the NFL-AFL merger was completed, the Chiefs won their second AFL Championship under head coach Hank Stram, and went on to lose in the inaugural Super Bowl against the Green Bay Packers.

It didn’t take long for them to return, with the Chiefs winning the last ever AFL Championship in the 1969 season and winning Super Bowl IV.

Since then, the Chiefs have looked pretty much identical to how they did when they moved to Kansas City in 1963.

Only a few minor changes have occurred throughout the team’s history including a shift from grey facemasks to white facemasks in 1974.

Beginning in 2009, the Chiefs started wearing red pants with their white away jerseys, and in 2013 they started to pair red pants with their red home jerseys. The Chiefs still wear a full-red uniform combination for select home prime-time games.

There’s an opportunity for the Chiefs to make a change for the first time in decades.

The team is moving from Missouri to Kansas in to build up a new 65,000-seat stadium that will open in 2031.

Will we see the team finally make some changes to their uniforms and logos? Or will they retain the timeless classics?

Only time will tell what the future of the Chiefs looks like.

Chris Jones and Travis Kelce have been part of an era of success in Kansas CityCredit: Getty