History of the Miami Dolphins

The Miami Dolphins are a professional American football franchise based in the Miami metropolitan area. The Dolphins compete in the National Football League (NFL) as a member club of the league's American Football Conference (AFC) East division. The Dolphins team was founded by attorney-politician Joe Robbie and actor-comedian Danny Thomas. They began play in the AFL in 1966. The region had not had a professional football team since the days of the Miami Seahawks, who played in the All-America Football Conference in 1946 before becoming the first incarnation of the Baltimore Colts.

The first professional American football team to be based in Miami and the state of Florida was the Miami Seahawks. The Seahawks entered the All-America Football Conference (AAFC) during its inaugural 1946 season, as the first major league-level sports franchise ever in Miami. However, the team lasted only one year before being confiscated by the league.

In 1962, the fledgling American Football League staged a preseason exhibition game between the Houston Oilers and the Dallas Texans. Three years later, the AFL awarded an expansion team franchise to lawyer Joseph Robbie and actor Danny Thomas for $7.5 million. Robbie had originally wanted to establish the franchise in Philadelphia, but AFL commissioner Joe Foss suggested courting Miami due to its warm climate, growing population, and lack of a football team. Thomas would eventually sell his stake in the team to Robbie. A contest was held in 1965 to choose the name of the team, which elicited 19,843 entries and over a thousand different names. The winning name, "Dolphins", was submitted by 622 entrants. During the summer of 1966, the Dolphins' training camp was in St. Pete Beach with practices in August at Boca Ciega High School in Gulfport.

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