A sudden hubbub has boiled over in the NFL world as some football fans realize that the Minnesota Vikings join the ranks of NFL teams with a male cheerleader squad.
This isn’t anything new. Men have been part of cheer squads for decades. That includes NFL teams who have added men as cheerleaders, particularly over the last few years.
Each of the last four Super Bowls has featured a team with male cheerleaders: The Philadelphia Eagles, San Francisco 49ers and Los Angeles Rams. The Kansas City Chiefs have kept an all-women cheer squad.
Yet men are not new to the role of cheerleader for men’s sports teams.
Here are some of the most famous men in America who have been cheerleaders in college.
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Ronald Reagan
Maybe no one embodies the conservative American movement of the last century than Ronald Reagan. While a student at Eureka College, Reagan was a cheerleader for the school’s sports teams.
Dwight D. Eisenhower
The 34th President of the United States was also one of the military masterminds behind the Allied victory over the Axis powers of Germany, Italy, Japan and others in WWII. He was a cheerleader at West Point, the Army academy.
George W. Bush
The 43rd President of the United States, former Texas Governor George W. Bush was a cheerleader at Yale in the 1960s.
Jimmy Stewart
When he was at Princeton, Jimmy Stewart was the head cheerleader for the Tigers. Stewart went on to become a powerful Hollywood actor. Despite norms today, that didn’t mean he was some left-wing activist. Stewart portrayed powerful roles of the common American, including his iconic roles in Mr. Smith Goes to Washington and It’s a Wonderful Life.
Samuel L. Jackson
Samuel L. Jackson was a cheerleader at Morehouse College in the 1960s. He’s claimed that he pursued cheerleading to meet women. Whether that’s true or not we’ll never know, even if it seems like he’s protesting too much. He did marry LaTanya Jackson, from Spelman College.
Kirk Douglas
Famed Hollywood actor Kirk Douglas was a cheerleader at Amsterdam High School in New York. He was nominated for the Best Actor Academy Award three times, but not for his iconic role as the every-man titular role in the epic film Spartacus.
Franklin D. Roosevelt
The only President of the United States to serve four terms — Franklin Delano Roosevelt — was in fact a cheerleader. He cheered on the sports teams at the rich-kids well-to-do Groton School in Massachusetts.
Trent Lott & Thad Cochran
Both of these U.S. Senators were cheerleaders at Ole Miss. Lott in particular was rabidly anti-gay, yet he was willing to take to the sidelines during games at Mississippi. That means the entire Mississippi Senate Delegation comprised of two Republican cheerleaders for a couple decades.
Yet anti-gay, conservative NFL fans are offended by a couple guys cheering for the Minnesota Vikings in the NFL.
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