LG’s Electric Football is the collection and solitaire game play pics and results of Leonard Gunderson. Leonard has an extensive collection of teams, many originals and some hand painted. (Photos by Leonard Gunderson)
“I get them off of eBay. Some I have painted myself, but very few. I have made a commitment to try and find as many original teams. A lot of them came from Tudor inventory at a reduced rate when I went to convention in DFW and got to go through a box given to me from Doug Strohm. It was like Christmas as a child. It got me rejuvenated in this hobby because I thought it was dead after Miggle took it over. Thank heavens Doug bought Tudor and revitalized the hobby. It’s given me something to do during retirement.” – Leonard Gunderson when asked about this collection.
Leonard Gunderson a.k.a. Lennie Gunderson
Retired after 37 years in the field of Computer Science and Sales Engineering
“I retired in July of 2018 and had always dabbled with electric football since 1969.
I got my first Tudor board featuring the prominent teams at the time – Rams and Packers For Christmas 1969. I was a huge Cowboys fan so that was the first team I filled out on the Tudor order form. With the Jets winning Super Bowl III, I had to order them and the Colts too. I also picked the Chiefs and Raiders, so I could play Super Bowl I, Super Bowl II, and the Ice Bowl. I preferred playing by myself. I also played against neighborhood friends because they had different teams and they had the bigger 620 boards.
As I aged through elementary school and saved my money from odd jobs, I would order more and more teams until I had all 26 teams. I remember how it seemed like forever to get them by mail. One thing I regret today is painting the original AFL teams – Chiefs, Bills, Dolphins, and Oilers, in their white uniforms because I could not order them that way. I would play games every day in my bedroom writing down stats in my little spiral notebook. Sunday’s and Monday nights would be special because I would play teams that were on TV.
When the NFL expanded to 28 teams, I couldn’t order the Bucs or Seahawks so I painted them, Bucs in white and Seahawks in dark. By the time I reached college in the late 70’s, I had grown away from playing the game but did not let my Mother throw out the teams or the game board. I had a special box made to store the teams in zip lock bags for safe keeping.
As I started my professional life, I took my teams and my board and moved to Texas. I would dig out the board from under the bed and play when football was in season and ending after replaying the Super Bowl.
Then before I knew it, I got married and started a family. My life got real busy working and raising kids. We thought it was best to store away the game until our children were older. I couldn’t wait until my son was of age to introduce him to electric football “Old Style”. But by then, Miggle had taken over the production and lost the NFL license so you couldn’t buy NFL teams any longer and the boards were lacking in quality. So I lost interest.
Then in July 2017, almost 20 years later, a miracle happened. I was reintroduced to miniature football through a convention in Dallas Fort Worth. I had no idea other fans like me kept the game alive through the years by making boards and competing. It was there I met Doug Strohm, who bought the Tudor name, the NFL license, and rejuvenated he company.
It was my lucky day. With the support of my wife and son, I went to the convention to see how the game evolved. I had no idea Doug and I would connect so well. He thought it was unique that I wanted to collect teams of different eras and play solitaire, not competitively. He offered me a new 9092 metal board at half price and had a box of old teams from inventory at 1/2 price as well. This included Miggle teams so I was able to get the rest of the 32 NFL teams.
That is what got me hooked again and started to enhance my collection with home and away teams that I continue with today. I also paint my own color rush teams (such as ‘19 Redskins, ‘19 Buccaneers, ‘19 Packers, coming are the ‘19 Cowboys and ‘19 Saints), old teams that are very difficult to acquire (such as the ‘66 Redskins, ‘70 Redskins Home Jersey) and not available at all (such as the ‘56 Rams, ‘59 Eagles, 2004 Bears Orange Jersey).
This collection has allowed me to setup schedules for solitaire play and play games for era’s in the 60’s, 70’s, 80’s, 90’s, 00’s, and 10’s. I also produced a Super Bowl Replay schedule book that allows me to use teams that match uniforms based on Grid Iron Uniform Database. These can be found on my Facebook (FB) Group Page LG’s Electric Football.
With the addition of NCAA teams, I have also started a college football replay schedule and continue to add teams to my collection.
All results of my NFL and NCAA games including summary, pictures, and videos, can be found on my FB Group page.
I want to thank Chris LeMay for asking me to display my collection on the National Electric Football Game Museum website. I consider it an honor to be asked and a tribute to all electric football hobbyists who enjoy it as much as I do. I hope this will inspire others to play the best table top game ever invented.”
The NCAA and College Football has long been a tradition in American Sports. Although using professional football teams has been the most popular way to enjoy playing the game of electric football, using college teams has also enjoyed a degree of popularity. Below are the stadium and teams that Leonard uses in his College Solitaire Electric Football League.
“The stadium is a design that my son and I came up with. I always wanted a flat stadium that surrounded the playing field for solo play. We adapted the old Tudor scoreboard and fans from my NFL game and came up with the college look. My son is a graphic designer and he used his skills to design the stadium. It has look of ivy from Mississippi Stadium and I had him put conference logos where the NFL helmets were in the Tudor design. He also made me an NFL stadium look I can use when I play NFL teams on my big board. I have yet to get that printed and cut out. This was a dream come true for me because the stadium perspective is pretty realistic and authentic.”
You can download a copy of the Super Bowl Came Replay notebook and the Super Bowl I Game report below (Thanks to Lennie for providing these downloads)
LG’s Electric Football SuperBowl Games Replay’s (published 2020)
The National Electric Football Game Museum 