War Memorial Stadium has produced countless glorious memories, but it also hosted a nationally televised chance to burnish Arkansas’ image that fell face-flat in the mud.
On a stormy Dec. 22, 1956, St. Joseph’s College of Indiana and Montana State University played for the small-college national championship in the one and only Aluminum Bowl.
Local leaders saw it as a chance to show off a modern Arkansas to the world, and national manufacturers Reynolds Aluminum and Alcoa, both with extensive operations in Saline County, sponsored the game.
Miss Arkansas Barbara Banks was on hand wearing a $25,000 dress made of aluminum, an item that would be worth $300,000 today. The Arkansas National Guard bragged that its color guard was seen by millions of NBC and CBS viewers nationwide.
But Arkansas’ fickle winter weather intervened, turning the field into a quagmire and forcing Miss Arkansas to appear at halftime with the custom dress hidden under rain gear.
Neither team scored in a disappointing 0-0 tie watched by just 5,000 fans in the 38,000-seat venue. And the players were dismayed that two Black teammates and a trainer were forced to stay at Black-only hotels.
Gov. Orval Faubus appeared at halftime, about nine months before presiding over the Little Rock Central High Crisis, where he used Arkansas Guardsmen to keep the Little Rock Nine from desegregating the high school.
The Aluminum Bowl was never played again. The National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics shifted its title game to Florida in 1957, inaugurating the Holiday Bowl.
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