Chicago Cardinals Charles Bidwill purchased the team, then known as the
Chicago Cardinals, from
David Jones in
1933. After his death at age 51 in 1947, his widow authorized business partner
Ray Bennigsen to carry on management of the team. Violet Bidwill married St. Louis businessman Walter Wolfner in 1949 and he later became managing director.
St. Louis Cardinals Prior to the
1960 season, Violet moved the Cardinals to
St. Louis. Charles Jr. and Bill inherited the team after their mother's death in January 1962, and served as co-owners for ten seasons, until Bill purchased it outright in
1972. Among NFL franchises, only the
Chicago Bears and
New York Giants have been controlled by one family longer than the Cardinals.
Arizona Cardinals Bidwill's ownership was marked by little success. In his years as at least part-owner, the Cardinals only made the playoffs eight times (1974, 1975, 1982, 1998, 2008, 2009, 2014, and 2015) and had only nine other winning seasons. He moved the team to
Phoenix, Arizona prior to the
1988 season after St. Louis refused to build a new stadium to replace
Busch Memorial Stadium. Bidwill had also publicly pledged to support a future effort to gain an expansion franchise for St. Louis. Instead, he voted to approve a new franchise in
Jacksonville, Florida. However, St. Louis eventually gained a new franchise anyway, the relocated
Los Angeles Rams in
1995. The Rams returned to Los Angeles in 2016. Bidwill had a reputation for running the Cardinals rather cheaply; the Cardinals had one of the lowest payrolls in the league for many years. Following the move to
State Farm Stadium in
2006, the team began to spend more money. The increased revenue paid off in
2008, when the Cardinals won their division for the first time since
1975 (when the team was based in St. Louis), hosted a playoff game for only the second time in franchise history (the previous coming in
1947 as a Chicago team) and advanced to
Super Bowl XLIII. They won two more division titles in
2009 and
2015. On September 11, 2022, Bidwill was inducted into the Arizona Cardinals Ring of Honor at a halftime ceremony where he is honored along with his father Charles. ==Personal life==