Super Bowl footballs take thoroughly rural route

Katie Thomas of The New York Times writes from Ada, Ohio, to tell "the legend of Wilson [Sporting Goods] factory workers in this town of 5,500 in rural Ohio, the birthplace of every football thrown in the Super Bowl since 1969." She notes that the National Football League is "the only major sports league whose balls are manufactured in the United States." (Encarta map)

The balls take a thoroughly rural route, beginning "on the backs of cows taken from feedlots in Iowa, Kansas and Nebraska," Thomas reports. Plant manager Daniel Riegle "said he preferred young, lean steers over fat dairy cows because their leather did not stretch as much." (Photo by J.D. Pooley shows Sharon Mullins stretching a hide. For a good slideshow of how a ball comes together, click here.)

The plant is unionized, with pay based on piecework. "Husbands and wives work alongside each other. So do mothers and daughters. The average employee has worked at the plant for 20 years, Riegle said," Thomas reports. "There is something special about working in the Wilson factory, many of the workers say, not least because Ada is a football town. The Ada Bulldogs made it to the Ohio high school football playoffs last year, and most of the workers are fans of either the Cleveland Browns or the Cincinnati Bengals, with a few Pittsburgh Steelers fans mixed in. Working at Wilson is a job, they said, but it is different from making rubber bands or ball bearings." (Read more)

To the weekly Ada Herald, circulation 2,800, the Super Bowl story is old news, but still worth noting. This week's edition has a front-page color photo by Larry D. Spradlin showing three workers at the plant inspecting footballs before shipment. To read the page, click here.