History of the Buffalo Bills

This article details the history of the Buffalo Bills. The team began play in 1960 as a charter member of the American Football League (AFL) and won two consecutive AFL titles in 1964 and 1965. The club joined the National Football League (NFL) as part of the 1970 AFL-NFL Merger. The Bills have the distinction of being the only team to advance to four consecutive Super Bowls, but also has the dubious distinction of losing all four of them.

The Bills were not the first professional football team to play in Buffalo, nor was it the first NFL team in the region. Professional football had been played in Buffalo and in upstate New York since the beginning of the 20th century. In 1915, Barney Lepper's "Buffalo All-Stars" were founded; the team would later be replaced by the Niagaras in 1918, then the Prospects in 1919. The Prospects were the basis of what would become the "Buffalo All-Americans," who joined what would become the NFL in 1920. After changing their name to the Bisons in 1924 (and, for one season, the Rangers in 1926), the team suspended operations in 1927, then came back in 1929 and re-folded at the end of that season.

After Buffalo hosted two NFL games in 1938 (a practice that would become a semi-regular occurrence in the city until the current team's arrival), the third American Football League installed the Buffalo Indians in the city; the Indians played two years before the league suspended and ultimately folded due to World War II. After the war, when the All-America Football Conference formed, Buffalo was again selected for a team; originally known as the Buffalo Bisons, the same name as a baseball team and (at the time) a hockey team in the area, the team sought a new identity and named itself the "Buffalo Bills" in 1947. When the AAFC merged with the NFL in 1950, the AAFC Bills were merged into the Cleveland Browns. Though there was no connection between the AAFC team and the current team, the Bills name proved popular enough that it was used as the namesake for the future American Football League team that would form in 1959.

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