- Jim Foster
Jim Foster is the founder and first
commissioner of theArena Football League . He is also a former NFL and USFL executive and was later the principal owner of the Iowa Barnstormers. Foster derived the basic concept ofArena football while watching a game ofindoor soccer being played atMadison Square Garden on February 11, 1981. He drew it out on a manila folder. The AFL began league play in 1987. In 1990, Foster was granted apatent on the game of Arena football and the equipment unique to it, particularly the end zone rebound nets, meaning that otherindoor football leagues not affiliated with the Arena organization were forced to play by at least somewhat different rules than the ones the AFL uses until the patent expired in September 2007.Jim is a fan of traditional jazz and plays trumpet whenever he gets the chance. He was born and raised in Davenport, Iowa - the same hometown as legendary jazz cornetist Bix Beiderbecke.
When Jim lived in Des Moines during his Iowa Barnstormer ownership days, he served as a member of the board of directors for Jazz Partnerz (Kurt Bowermaster, president), the non-profit group that planned and organized the Greater Des Moines Good Times Jazz Festival.
However, the Jim Foster who was Rewrite Chief for the Toronto Telegram in the early 1960s, although a keen fan of jazz, had a tin ear and played no musical instruments.
Wikimedia Foundation. 2010.