Dallas Cowboys

The Dallas Cowboys , otherwise known as “America’s Team,” are nonetheless, about as Texan as you can get. When the franchise was awarded in 1960, the original plan was to call them the Dallas Rangers. That idea was scrapped quickly because the city already had a baseball team by that name. Instead, they chose Cowboys — a word that carried the essence of Texas and its frontier spirit. It evoked independence, toughness, and the open plains.

The cowboy identity was rooted in the real cattle industry of Texas. After the Civil War, cowboys drove millions of longhorns along the Chisholm Trail and Goodnight–Loving Trail to railheads in Kansas, where cattle were shipped east. Dallas and Fort Worth became booming stockyard and meatpacking centres, drawing workers, railroads, and capital. By the early 20th century, barbed wire, refrigerated railcars, and feedlots transformed ranching into modern agribusiness. The image of the cowboy — resilient, fearless, enduring — remained a cultural icon even as the industry moved on. Naming Dallas’s NFL team the Cowboys tied modern football to this history of grit and commerce.

But Dallas itself didn’t stop at cattle. The city grew into a centre of oil wealth, banking, real estate, and later technology. By the late 20th century, it was the beating heart of North Texas’s “Metroplex,” a sprawling hub of highways, glass towers, and global companies. That mix of old cattle wealth and new corporate ambition defined Dallas’s identity: tough yet forward-looking. The city’s profile was boosted even further by the 1980s TV drama Dallas, which broadcast images of oilmen, skyscrapers, and Texas swagger to millions worldwide. Just as J.R. Ewing symbolised Texas business on screen, the Cowboys came to symbolise Texas sport on the field.

On the turf, the Cowboys built dynasties. Under Tom Landry, the stoic coach with his fedora hat, Dallas became a model of innovation: the flex defence and the shotgun formation – staples of the game today – were Landry inventions. They appeared in five Super Bowls from the late 1960s to the early 1980s, winning two (VI, XII) with Roger Staubach, Tony Dorsett, and “Too Tall” Jones as stars. In the 1990s, under owner Jerry Jones, coach Jimmy Johnson, and the “Triplets” — Troy Aikman, Emmitt Smith, and Michael Irvin — the Cowboys won three Super Bowls (XXVII, XXVIII, XXX). With five Lombardi trophies, they remain one of the NFL’s most decorated franchises.

Their home reflects that ambition. The Cowboys play at AT&T Stadium in Arlington, opened in 2009 and nicknamed “Jerry World.” It cost over $1 billion, funded partly by public money: in 2004, Arlington voters approved a sales-tax hike to help cover construction. The result was a football palace: a retractable roof, the world’s largest HD video board at the time, and space for 80,000 fans (expandable to over 100,000). Like Texas itself, it was built to impress.

Owner Jerry Jones, who bought the team in 1989, is as famous as many of his players. A relentless businessman and showman, Jones turned the Cowboys into the most valuable sports franchise in the world, worth billions. He embodies the same bravado as the team’s star logo, blending oilman boldness with modern corporate power.

No story of the Cowboys is complete without the Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders. Founded officially in 1972, they revolutionised cheerleading with glamour, choreography, and mass appeal. They became international icons, appearing on TV, touring with the USO (to armed forces locations across the world), and starring in the 2024 Netflix series America’s Sweethearts: Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders. They remain perhaps the most famous cheerleading squad in the world, adding to the Cowboys’ brand as both sport and entertainment empire.

The Cowboys’ fanbase is vast, stretching far beyond Texas. Branded “America’s Team” in a 1978 NFL highlight film, the name stuck because it reflected reality: the Cowboys’ silver star became a national symbol.

The Dallas Cowboys embody the spirit of the cattle trails, the swagger of oilmen and bankers, the glamour of cheerleaders, and the power of a billion-dollars. Their lone star shines not just for Texas, but for the scale of their ambition: to be the biggest and brightest in America.