Bob Howsam

Robert Lee Howsam (February 28, 1918 – February 19, 2008) was an executive in American professional sport who, in 1959, played a key role in establishing two leagues—the American Football League, which succeeded and merged with the National Football League, and baseball's Continental League, which never played a game but forced expansion of Major League Baseball from 16 to 20 teams in 1961–62. Howsam later became further well known in baseball as the highly successful general manager and club president of the Cincinnati Reds during the "Big Red Machine" dynasty of the 1970s.

Born in Denver, Colorado, Howsam served as a U.S. Navy pilot during World War II. He was the son-in-law of United States Senator and two-term Colorado Governor Edwin C. Johnson. Johnson also was involved with professional baseball as founder and first president of the postwar Class A Western League, an upper-level minor league that played from 1947 to 1958.

Howsam first made a name for himself as a highly successful baseball executive. He led the family-owned Denver Bears of the Class A Western League and Triple-A American Association from 1947 to 1962. For building one of the most successful minor league franchises of the 1950s, Howsam was twice (1951 and 1956) named Minor League Executive of the Year by The Sporting News. The Howsams also built Bears Stadium, a minor league baseball park which, after renovation and expanded capacity, became famous as the Denver Broncos' noisy, raucous and perpetually sold-out home from 1960 to 2001, Mile High Stadium. While the Bears achieved great success as a Triple-A farm team of the New York Yankees in the late 1950s, their earlier tie-up with the Pittsburgh Pirates (1952–54) served to introduce Howsam to Pirates' general manager Branch Rickey, the Baseball Hall of Fame executive, who had revolutionized baseball in his earlier career with the St. Louis Cardinals and Brooklyn Dodgers. Rickey would play an influential role later in Howsam's career.

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