Based in Pittsburgh, the Pittsburgh Steelers are a professional American football team. As a member team of the American Football Conference (AFC) North Division, the Steelers participate in the National Football League (NFL). The Steelers are the oldest team in the AFC and the seventh-oldest in the NFL, having been founded in 1933.
The Steelers are one of the most successful NFL teams in the post-merger (modern) period, especially during its dynasty in the 1970s, in contrast to their reputation as perpetual also-rans in the pre-merger NFL, where they were the oldest team never to have won a league championship.[6][7][8] The group has shared the record for Super Bowl victories with the New England Patriots, at six, and they have both participated in (16) and hosted.
The Steelers entered the NFL as the Pittsburgh Pirates on July 8, 1933, and their origins can be traced back to a local professional team that was founded in the early 1920s. As was customary for NFL teams at the time, Art Rooney owned the team, which originally adopted its name from the baseball team of the same name.[5] Local media began referring to the football team as the Rooneymen in order to set them apart from the baseball team; this unofficial moniker lasted for decades after the team officially acquired its current name. Ever since the team was established, the Rooney family has owned a majority stake in the Steelers.[9] Dan Rooney, the son of Art Rooney, was the team’s owner from 1988 until his passing in 2017. a great deal of control over
On September 20, 1933, the Pittsburgh Pirates, who would later become the NFL’s Pittsburgh Steelers, played their inaugural game against the New York Giants, 23–2.[5] The Pirates never had a record greater than.500 (1936) or placed higher than second in their division during the 1930s.[11] Pittsburgh did create history in 1938 when they signed Byron White, who would go on to become a Justice of the United States Supreme Court, to the largest contract in NFL history at the time. However, White only played for the Pirates for one season before joining the Detroit Lions.[5][12] The Pirates changed their name to the Steelers before the 1940 season.
There was a player scarcity for the Steelers during World War II. In order to field a squad, they combined with other NFL teams twice.