Texas Stadium

The Dallas Cowboys had played at the Cotton Bowl in Dallas since their inception in 1960. By the mid-1960s, founding owner Clint Murchison, Jr. felt that the Fair Park area had become unsafe and downtrodden and did not want season ticket holders forced to go through it. After being denied a request to build a new stadium in downtown Dallas, Murchison and Cowboys general manager Tex Schramm announced a plan in 1967 to build a new stadium in the northwest suburb of Irving. Ground was broken on January 26, 1969, and the stadium opened on October 24, 1971, with a 44-21 Cowboys victory over the New England Patriots. Texas Stadium was part of a new wave of football-only stadiums built following the AFL-NFL merger, alongside Schaefer Stadium, Arrowhead Stadium, Rich Stadium, and the Pontiac Silverdome. More so than its contemporaries, it featured a proliferation of luxury boxes, which provided the team with a large new income source exempt from league revenue sharing. The stadium became an icon of the Cowboys with their rise in national prominence. The Cowboys entered the inaugural 1971 season as defending NFC champions and won their first world title in Super Bowl VI in January 1972. The field was surrounded by a blue wall emblazoned with white stars, an iconic design replicated in its successor, AT&T Stadium. In its inaugural season the wall was plain concrete gray; it was painted blue for the 1972 season, and the white stars were added in 1975. The most distinctive element of Texas Stadium was its partial roof, the only one in the NFL. The roof was originally supposed to be the first retractable roof in the NFL, but the plan was abandoned due to cost and engineering concerns, leaving the famous open hole over the centre of the field. The stadium also hosted the Dallas Tornado of the North American Soccer League from 1972 to 1975 and 1980 to 1981, and the SMU Mustangs college football team from 1979 to 1986. The Cowboys played their final game at Texas Stadium on December 20, 2008, before moving to Cowboys Stadium (now AT&T Stadium) in Arlington in 2009. Texas Stadium was demolished on April 11, 2010, by a controlled implosion.

Texas Stadium was famously known for its distinctive hole in the roof, the result of abandoned plans to build the NFL's first retractable roof. The open roof meant that, despite being indoors, the field was exposed to the elements, leading to the famous quip that God watches His team play through the hole in the roof. The stadium cost US$35 million to build in 1971, equivalent to about $278 million in 2025. It was the home of the Dallas Cowboys for 38 seasons, during which the team won three Super Bowls (VI, XII, and XXVII). The field was surrounded by a blue wall emblazoned with white stars, an iconic design later replicated at AT&T Stadium. The wall was plain concrete gray in 1971, painted blue in 1972, and given white stars in 1975. It was part of a new wave of football-only stadiums with artificial turf built after the AFL-NFL merger. The stadium also hosted the Dallas Tornado of the NASL and the SMU Mustangs college football team. The Cowboys played their final game there on December 20, 2008. The stadium was demolished by controlled implosion on April 11, 2010, an event that drew thousands of spectators.