The Melrose Athletic Club was a professional

football Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kicking a ball to score a goal. Unqualified, the word ''football'' normally means the form of football that is the most popular where the word is used. Sports commonly c ...

team based in

Atlantic City Atlantic City, often known by its initials A.C., is a coastal resort city in Atlantic County, New Jersey, United States. The city is known for its casinos, Boardwalk (entertainment district), boardwalk, and beaches. In 2020 United States censu ...

, New Jersey from 1921 until around 1927. The club which was also known as the Atlantic City Roses and the Atlantic City Atlantics was arguably the most popular football team in New Jersey during the 1920s. Due to the team's location in Atlantic City, the Roses attracted several of the teams from the

Anthracite League The Anthracite League, also referred to as the Anthracite Association, was a short-lived American football minor league comprising teams based in coal-mining towns in eastern Pennsylvania (hence the league name's reference to anthracite coal). Th ...

, based in Pennsylvania, as well as the

Canton Bulldogs The Canton Bulldogs were a professional American football team, based in Canton, Ohio. They played in the Ohio League from 1903 to 1906 and 1911 to 1919, and the American Professional Football Association (later renamed the National Football Leag ...

, Frankford Yellow Jackets,

Pottsville Maroons The Pottsville Maroons were an American football team based in Pottsville, Pennsylvania, in the northeastern part of the state. Founded in 1920, they played in the National Football League (NFL) from 1925 to 1928. In 1929 they relocated to Boston ...

and Rochester Jeffersons of the National Football League. From 1926 until 1927 Melrose joined the

Eastern League of Professional Football The Eastern League of Professional Football was an american football minor league formed in 1926 by independent clubs from Pennsylvania and New Jersey (separate from the ''" Eastern Pennsylvania Football League"'' which played in the late 1930s a ...

. The team would later return to the independent circuit after the league folded in 1927. During the 1927 season the Roses acquired many players from the now-defunct Philadelphia Quakers who were named

American Football League The American Football League (AFL) was a major professional American football league that operated for ten seasons from 1960 until 1970, when it merged with the older National Football League (NFL), and became the American Football Conference. ...

a year earlier. Al Kruez and George Sullivan were in the Roses line-up for an October 2, 1927 game against the Staten Island Stapletons. The Roses lost the game 6-0 after a late fourth quarter

fumble A fumble in gridiron football occurs when a player who has possession and control of the ball loses it before being downed (tackled), scoring, or going out of bounds. By rule, it is any act other than passing, kicking, punting, or successful ...

. Atlantic City's star of the game was end

Whitey Thomas William C. "Whitey" Thomas (August 17, 1895 – August 1978) was an American football end. He played for the Frankford Yellow Jackets in 1924 in the National Football League and for the Philadelphia Quakers in 1926 in the first American Fo ...

, another ex-Quaker, who caught four passes for 101 yards. The team played all of its home games at Bader Field which was, and still is, a part of Atlantic City's airport. The team disappeared after 1927; though no record is known to exist of them folding (not an uncommon occurrence among independent teams), teams that normally played them, such as the

Bayonne Vikings Bayonne (; eu, Baiona ; oc, label= Gascon, Baiona ; es, Bayona) is a city in Southwestern France near the Spanish border. It is a commune and one of two subprefectures in the Pyrénées-Atlantiques department, in the Nouvelle-Aquitaine ...

and the Orange Tornadoes, suddenly stopped doing so, since no records of games against Atlantic City exist after 1927.

References

{{reflist Defunct American football teams in New Jersey History of Atlantic City, New Jersey Early professional American football teams in New Jersey American football teams established in 1921 American football teams disestablished in 1927 1921 establishments in New Jersey 1927 disestablishments in New Jersey