Logos and Uniforms of The New York Giants - Uniforms - 1950-60

1950-60

Current Giants fans might be surprised to learn that prior to 1953, "Big Blue" wore red jerseys for some home games. Through 1953, the typical Giants home uniform consisted of solid red or blue jerseys with white block numbers, blue helmets, white pants with red socks, and black cleats. The standard road uniform used the same helmet, a white jersey with red block numbers and no sleeve trim; later the jersey acquired red Northwestern stripes on the sleeves (the Northwestern stripe pattern, named after the college that is believed to have originated it, is composed of three parallel horizontal stripes, with the central stripe approximately double the thickness of the other two), white pants with red socks, and black cleats.

The 1954 season saw two major changes: blue as the standard home jersey and new road pants. Due to a push by the NFL for franchises to settle on a single color for jerseys, the Giants replaced red with blue as the sole jersey color for home games. Red would not be featured as a primary home jersey color until the design was resurrected in the 2004 season as the Giants' official "alternate" jersey. Second, the road uniform switched white pants for gray ones.

In 1955, the red socks were replaced by blue ones for home games.

In 1956, the team's first year in Yankee Stadium, the Giants wore white jerseys for most home games. These white jerseys, with their red numerals and "Northwestern-style" stripes, featured new red "TV numbers" above the stripes. These white jerseys were worn on the day of the team's 47-7 victory over the Chicago Bears in the NFL Championship game at "The Stadium."

Appearing on the Giants' helmets for the first time in 1958 were the players' uniform numbers. The two digits, in a small white Futura font, were placed to the left and right of the red center stripe, at both the front and base of the helmet. (The first Giant player of contemporary times to be assigned a single-digit number, placekicker Pete Gogolak, wore a helmet with his number "3" placed over the red center stripe). This style and placement of helmet number was adopted in 1963 by the Pittsburgh Steelers, who kept the design into the 1990s.

The Giants' basic uniform template survived until 1957 or '58, when a non-contiguous blue-red-blue tri-stripe design on the sides of the legs for both home and road pants appeared. In 1960, an integrated khaki belt was introduced to the pants, but the belt lasted a single season.

It is important to note that uniforms in the NFL at this time were nowhere nearly as standardized as they are today, so the "template" for Giants uniforms during this period was subject to variations that would be considered major today, such as the aforementioned switching of red and blue jerseys at home. Most notably, players from this period were photographed wearing either leather helmets dyed blue without a central red stripe, or with blue plastic helmets featuring the signature red stripe and tethered to the players' heads with a leather chin strap.