What is the Origin of the Cincinnati Bengal Name?

The Cincinnati Bengals, the current professional football team in Cincinnati, were named after an earlier professional football team in the 1930s to give the team and fans a sense of history.

  1. The First Bengals

    • In 1937 a football team called "The Cincinnati Bengals" was started in Cincinnati under the American Football League, or AFL. There is no record of how this name was selected at the time.

    Ups and Downs

    • The American Football League disbanded after that season, and the Cincinnati Bengals continued as an independent team. The American Football League briefly started up again in 1939 and folded after one season, and then reemerged again in 1940 and disbanded in 1941. The Cincinnati Bengals joined the American Football League during both of these incarnations. The Bengals broke up after the 1941 season ended.

    The New Bengals

    • After 26 years, the American Football League started up yet again, and a new Cincinnati team was formed. Then-owner Paul Brown, who had founded and coached the Cincinnati Browns from the late 1940s to the early 1960s, named this new team the Bengals, "to give it a link with past professional football in Cincinnati."