Art McNally, the first on-field National Football League official to be inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame, died on Sunday in Yardley, Pa. He was 97.
The death, at a hospice near his home, was confirmed by his son Thomas.
Mr. McNally was enshrined in the Hall of Fame, in Canton, Ohio, last year, along with, among others, the former Jacksonville Jaguars tackle Tony Boselli and the former coach and broadcaster Dick Vermeil. He joined the National Football League in 1959 as a field judge, positioned behind the defense, at a time when professional football was just beginning its ascent to the pinnacle of American sports.
Mr. McNally worked the gridiron as a referee, or crew chief, starting in 1960. At the time, the league consisted of only 13 teams (it had 12 until the addition of the expansion Dallas Cowboys that year); he remained in that role until 1967, the year of the first Super Bowl. (Mr. McNally was an alternate for that game, between the Green Bay Packers and Kansas City Chiefs.)
In 1968 he left his field duties for an office in the league’s New York headquarters, taking over as supervisor of officials. In that position, he developed training films and created a meticulous four-step evaluation process for league officials.
Mr. McNally also implemented rule changes, including the illegal-contact rule, which restricted contact on receivers by defenders in coverage beyond five yards from the line of scrimmage, as well as allowing offensive linemen to extend their arms and open their hands when pass blocking.
He remained in the job until 1991, guiding the league’s officiating through its 1970 merger with the rival American Football League and staying on as it grew into a multibillion-dollar juggernaut of 28 teams. (It now has 32.)
As football was blossoming into what many fans saw as the ultimate television sport, Mr. McNally championed the use of technology. He oversaw the adoption of video review on close calls, which earned him the unofficial title “Father of Instant Replay” in league circles.
Through it all, former colleagues said, he maintained a reputation for rigor and quiet authority.
“When Art spoke, it was like the Oracle of Delphi speaking, because he never said anything that was flip,” Paul Tagliabue, who began working with Mr. McNally when he was named league commissioner in 1989, said in a video interview last year. “Everything that he said was based on reviewing game film, reviewing the performance of the men on the field and knowing the rule book.”
That word “integrity” often came up among league officials when discussing Mr. McNally’s contributions to the game.
“Art McNally was an extraordinary man, the epitome of integrity and class,” Roger Goodell, the current N.F.L. commissioner, said in a statement after Mr. McNally’s death. “Throughout his distinguished officiating career, he earned the eternal respect of the entire football community.”
No-nonsense to the core, Mr. McNally did not speak of himself in such grandiose terms. “I couldn’t always be right,” he once said. “But I always tried to be honest. I was that way when I was working sandlot games in Philadelphia, and I was that way in the N.F.L. I gave it my best shot every time out.”
Arthur Ignatius McNally was born in Philadelphia on July 1, 1925, one of five children of James McNally, a firefighter, and Madge (Boyle) McNally. An athletic youth who loved playing football and other sports, he attended Roman Catholic High School in the city, then joined the Marine Corps after graduating in 1942. He served in the Pacific theater through the end of the war and beyond — he was stationed in Japan during the American occupation.
He got his first experience as a referee during the war, when his fellow Marines chose him to call a pickup football game because they considered him the member of the unit best suited to the role. “One of the guys said, ‘Let’s get Art, he’s honest,’” Thomas McNally said. “He was always a straight shooter.”
After Mr. McNally returned home to Philadelphia, he married Rita Krout and, with the help of the G.I. Bill, attended Temple University, where he studied to become a physical education teacher. Early in his teaching days, he also learned to officiate, calling countless high school football and basketball games. He continued to teach for decades, since his officiating work was seasonal.
His first paid officiating job came in October 1946, when he took home $5 for calling a Catholic Youth Organization football game, according to The Philadelphia Inquirer.
“They didn’t make that much money then,” Thomas McNally said. “He had a book somewhere where he wrote down every game he ever worked and how much he made. Sometimes it was less than $2.”
Before long he was officiating basketball and baseball games as well. By the late 1950s, he was working college football games on Saturdays as well as National Basketball Association games; he had plans to become a major-league baseball umpire when the N.F.L. hired him.
In addition to his son Thomas Mr. McNally is survived by his wife, Sharon, whom he married in 1986; two other children, Marybeth and Michael; and eight grandchildren. His first wife died in 1981, and his daughter Rita died in 2019 of cancer.
He spent his career adjudicating high-stakes games under the intense scrutiny of tens of thousands of fans in the stadium and millions watching from home, but he never let the pressure get to him — even when players and coaches were screaming at him on the field, which was often.
“He never wavered,” Thomas McNally said. “He was an old Marine. They really don’t change very much.”
His father, he recalled, later explained to him, “I just listened to what they had to say, then I came back and told them what really happened.”
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