Pro football was popularized in Ohio when the amateur Massillon Tigers hired four Pittsburgh pros to play in the season-ending game against Akron.

The team opted not to join the APFA (later renamed the NFL) in 1920; it remained an independent club through 1923, when the Tigers folded.

The Massillon area had fielded several amateur football teams featuring only local players since the early 1890s.

Meanwhile, Ed J. Stewart, a young and ambitious editor of the city newspaper The Evening Independent, was named as the team's first coach.

Wise, who was the Massillon Clerk of City Council, led a committee to secure the necessary funds for a new football and jerseys that were nearly the same color.

During the game a Massillon end named Walt Roepke ran a punt back for a touchdown.

In fact the Bulldogs, or Canton Athletic Club as it was called at the time, formed their football team in 1905 with sole objective of beating the Tigers, who had won every Ohio League championship since 1903.

[5] In the off-season prior to the 1906 season, a news story in The Plain Dealer alleged that the Canton Athletic Club was financially broke and could not pay its players for that final game.

The only problem with Massillon's figures was that they only listed salaries, including railroad fare, at $6,740.95, which means the players were getting only about $50 per game.

Sherburn Wightman, who played under Amos Alonzo Stagg at the University of Chicago, was then named the team's new coach.

The Massillon Independent newspaper alleged that the Bulldogs coach, Blondy Wallace, and Tigers end, Walter East, had conspired to fix a two-game series between the two clubs.

Although Massillon could not prove that Canton had indeed thrown the second game, the scandal tarnished the Bulldog and Tiger names and helped ruin professional football in Ohio until the mid 1910s.

The team defeated the Columbus Panhandles, with the Nesser Brothers in the line-up, 13-4, and celebrated its fifth consecutive state championship.

Cusack believed that a game against a strong Massillon team and a restart of the historic Canton-Massillon rivalry was bound to bring in fans to Canton.

However, in order to get the team fielded, Massillon planned to raid the Akron Indians roster of its key players.

Massillon hired new ringers for a new bidding war with Canton, however Cusack signed the legendary Jim Thorpe to his squad.

[10] This would be Massillon's last "Ohio League" title, and a disputed one at that—the very Patricians squad that the Tigers had raided earlier in the season had racked up an even more impressive 9-0-1 record against lesser talent, including a win against the Washington Vigilants, one of the East Coast's top professional teams, leading many observers to give Youngstown the title instead.

For example, Knute Rockne, Charles Brickley, Gus Dorais, Bob Nash, Stan Cofall, and, future Hall of Famer, Greasy Neale.

However, despite record crowds for two Bulldog-Tigers match-ups, Massillon lost money on the season, while Canton barely made a profit.

However, later that season Cofall and Bob Peck decided to play for Massillon which prematurely ended the Pats 1917 campaign.

The only way to make the Tigers profitable was to use Peggy Parratt's old Akron scheme of bringing in just enough high-priced stars to win.

The managers decided on a pay scale for officials and agreed to refrain from stealing each other's players for the upcoming season.

However, the big surprise came when Massillon backer Jack Donahue refused to go along with a proposal to limit salaries.

However, due to a dispute over the application of New York's blue laws, that prohibited playing football on Sundays, Brickley's Giants were forced to fold.

During late August and early September of that same year, Ralph Hay and Jim Thorpe tried without success to find a backer for a new Massillon team.

Cupid Black, an All-America guard from Yale, was also rumored to restart the Tigers franchise, however he later turned down the offer.

[14] On September 17, 1920, at Ralph Hay's Hupmobile dealership in Canton, the charter members of the future NFL formally established the new league.

Hay and the other managers turned down the offer because they didn't feel the franchise would pan out and because nobody wanted to see the proud Massillon Tigers name demeaned and made a road attraction.

The current Akron owners, now renamed the Pros, Art Ranney and Frank Nied were also associated with Maginnis during his ownership of the team in 1919, and had many problems with him during that season.

[14] The 10 teams represented at the September 17 meeting are considered charter members of the AFPA, and, by extension, of the National Football league.