On this day 40 years ago: Chicago welcomes home the Super Bowl champion Chicago Bears
Tuesday marks 40 years since throngs of Chicagoans braved subzero wind chills to welcome home the Super Bowl champion Chicago Bears.
The parade along LaSalle Street downtown and the rally in Daley Plaza came a day after what many may argue remains the defining moment in Chicago Bears history, as the Bears beat the New England Patriots 46-10 and became Super Bowl champions.
The historic season and the big game
Guided by Iron Mike Ditka and defensive coordinator Buddy Ryan, and led by icons such as "Punky QB" Jim McMahon, revered running back Walter Payton, and defensive end Richard Dent, the 1985 Bears played a magical season that involved a 15-1 record. The Bears also had a record in another sense of the word —a hit rap record in "The Super Bowl Shuffle" that was recorded and released before the Bears even knew they were going to the Super Bowl.
But go to the Super Bowl they did. At Soldier Field, the Bears beat the New York Giants in 21-0 in the NFC Divisional Round on Jan. 5, and the Los Angeles Rams 24-0 in the NFC Championship Game on Jan. 12. And then, on Jan. 26, 1986, the Bears squared off against the Patriots at the Louisiana Superdome in New Orleans.
As recalled by NFL senior writer Larry Mayer, the game didn't start out perfect for the Bears. Payton fumbled on the second play from scrimmage, and the Patriots recovered at the Bears' 19-yard line. The Pats went on to score first, with a field goal by Tony Franklin that put them in the lead 3-0.
But after that, the Bears clobbered the Patriots with 44 unanswered points.
Kevin Butler kicked a 28-yard field goal for the Bears to tie the score. Dent forced fumbles on consecutive Patriots possessions, which Dan Hampton and Mike Singletary each recovered, recalled Mayer. The turnovers resulted in a 24-yard field goal for Butler and an 11-yard touchdown by Matt Suhey.
McMahon scored a two-yard touchdown near the end of the half. With another field goal by Butler on the final play, the Bears were up 23-3 at halftime.
In the third, McMahon scored a 1-yard touchdown, and Reggie Phillips returned an interception to score another touchdown, bringing the score to 37-3. William "The Refrigerator" Perry scored yet another touchdown to bring the score to 44-3, recalled Mayer.
The Patriots scored a touchdown in the fourth quarter, while the Bears scored a safety for two final points on as Henry Waechter tackled Pats quarterback Steve Grogan in the endzone.
The Bears won 46-10.
Throngs of fans brave cold for Bears victory parade
The following day, Monday, Jan. 27, the Bears returned home to Chicago for a parade that drew half a million fans to the streets of the Loop. The parade made its way from LaSalle Street at Jackson Boulevard to Daley Plaza — renamed Bears Plaza for the occasion.
Published reports also note that the temperature in Chicago that day was about 5 degrees, with wind chills estimated, depending on the source, at -22 to -32. Bears fans could not have cared less. They piled into the streets like it was the middle of June.
Video showed fans even climbing onto lampposts and hanging onto street signs to watch the parade. People stood on top of buildings and the Block 37 power station, and workers were crowded in front of every office window.
According to contemporary published reports, there had been rumors that students in the Chicago Public Schools would be given the day off for something of a Bears championship holiday. They didn't, and the Chicago Board of Education put out a statement saying as much, reports noted. But many private and parochial schools did close, and the kids who attended those schools went to the parade instead, reports said.
CBS News Chicago — known as Channel 2 News back then — had a team of reporters covering the Bears parade. Feature reporter Bob Wallace watched as the buses tried to push through the crowd along LaSalle Street near the Board of Trade.
As stated by reporter Phil Ponce on Channel 2's The 10 O'clock News that night: "It may have been easier for Moses to part the Red Sea than it was for the [Bears' team] buses to get through the sea of fans, anxious to catch a glimpse of the Super Bowl champs."
The original plan had been for the Bears to travel the parade route in open convertible cars, anchorman Bill Kurtis noted during CBS Chicago's coverage. But the team ended up staying on the buses they had boarded earlier at O'Hare International Airport after flying back from New Orleans, except for Ditka, who rode in an open limousine, reports noted.
Meanwhile, anchorman Don Craig and weatherman John Coughlin were on the scene at Bears Plaza, where Craig said, "Every square inch of real estate for probably five blocks around here is taken up with people."
Ticker tape and confetti rained down along LaSalle Street and from City Hall. A big-screen TV was set up in Bears Plaza, where Mayor Harold Washington and Bears President Mike McCaskey were waiting with triumphant words.
"We're number one! We're number one!" Mayor Washington said. "We're number one, one, one!"
Some of the Bears' star players were up there on the podium too, but Mayor Washington said at the rally that some could not get off the buses to get there.
Several of the champion Bears could not attend the parade and rally at all — including some of the most important ones. McMahon, Super Bowl MVP Dent, Jimbo Covert, Dave Duerson, Dan Hampton, Jay Hilgenberg, Mike Singletary, and Otis Wilson had to rush to Hawaii ahead of the 1986 Pro Bowl, which was played the following Sunday.
Payton also had to be in Hawaii for Pro Bowl preps the day of the festivities in Chicago. He flew back to Chicago on a private plane before heading to Hawaii, but was not at the parade, according to published reports.
But while he was not on the podium for the honors, Payton was the star player who received the most adoration at the rally. Even Mayor Washington chanted, "Walter! Walter! Walter!" along with the crowd.
"He's earned that respect. He's earned that respect as a man and as a football player," McCaskey said of Payton at the rally. "He can stand for the Chicago Bears."
While Payton didn't score a touchdown during Super Bowl XX, the veteran running back's outstanding performance on the field had been crucial to the 1985 Bears' success that year. Payton, who died in 1999, remains the Chicago Bear most would likely pick if assembling a Mount Rushmore of Chicago sports icons.
At the rally, McCaskey also sang Ditka's praises.
"We have in Mike Ditka a coach who better than any other stands for the values of Papa Bear Halas," McCaskey said at the rally. "He stands for toughness, he stands for a joy in competing, and he hates like hell to lose — that's Mike Ditka."
Papa Bear Halas, of course, was George S. Halas, the founder and longtime owner of the Bears and McCaskey's grandfather. Halas had died a little over two years earlier.
After McCaskey's remarks, five stars of the team — Willie Gault, Emery Moorehead, Kevin Butler, Steve "Mongo" McMichael, and Tom Thayer — each spoke on the podium during CBS Chicago's coverage of the Bears Plaza rally.
"I just have one thing to say — we all have bragging rights over the whole g**damn country!" said McMichael, who died in 2025 after a battle with ALS.
Philip Miller, chairman and chief executive officer of Marshall Field & Co., presented McCaskey with a Waterford crystal Super Bowl football. Afterward, a new street sign was unveiled, adding the honorary name of George S. Halas Drive for what is now called DuSable Lake Shore Drive from Monroe Drive across the bridge and north to Huron Street.
Chicago's top TV sports anchors were up on the podium too, including CBS Chicago's Johnny Morris — a former Bears running back and wide receiver who had been on the pre-Super Bowl 1963 championship team — and Tim Weigel, later also of CBS Chicago, but with ABC 7 back then. Morris introduced some of the Bears players as they took to the podium to speak.
As they spoke, the Bears' star players themselves were anticipating a return to the Super Bowl the following season. Speaking to Bill Kurtis and Walter Jacobson back in the newsroom, no lesser authority than sports broadcaster Jack Brickhouse said Super Bowl XX would not be the last to be heard from that Bears team.
"I think one of the things that the people here kind of suspect is that we're not looking at a one-time shot," Brickhouse said that day. "We're looking at, if you want to use that word, the building of a dynasty."
But the Bears and Super Bowl XX weren't top of mind for America for too long. On Tuesday, Jan. 28, just a day after the parade, the space shuttle Challenger was set to lift off from Cape Canaveral in Florida — with New Hampshire teacher Christa McAuliffe on board along with Cmdr. Francis "Dick" Scobee, pilot Michael Smith, mission specialists Ellison Onizuka, Judith Resnik, and Ronald McNair, and satellite engineer Gregory Jarvis.
As America watched, awe turned to horror as the shuttle broke apart 73 seconds after liftoff because of a rupture in one of its solid-fuel boosters, killing everyone on board.
As for the Bears' fortunes, they did not make a repeat visit to the Super Bowl the following season. They lost to Washington in the NFC Divisional Playoff game on Jan. 3, 1987, and were thereby eliminated.
The following year, the Bears lost the NFC Divisional game to Washington again. The year after that, the Bears defeated the Philadelphia Eagles in the famous Fog Bowl at Soldier Field on New Year's Eve 1988, but went on to be clobbered by the San Francisco 49ers in the NFC Championship Game. The Bears missed the playoffs in 1989.
Ditka was fired following the 1992 season, by which point most of the stars of the Super Bowl champion team had moved on.
The Bears made the playoffs in the 1994, 2001, and 2005 seasons, and then returned to the Super Bowl to face the Indianapolis Colts in the 2006 season, under head coach Lovie Smith and led by quarterback Rex Grossman. But Sunday, Feb. 4, 2007, was not to be a repeat of Sunday, Jan. 26, 1986, it was practically all downhill for the Bears after Devin Hester ran back the opening kickoff 92 yards for a touchdown. The Bears lost 29-17.
Since then, there have been some good seasons, but the Bears have all too often been a disappointment. That all changed in the 2025 season, when a trend toward late-game comebacks had the Bears nicknamed the Cardiac Bears.
With head coach Ben Johnson and quarterback Caleb Williams at the helm, the 2025 Bears beat the Green Bay Packers in a magical turnaround this past Jan. 10, only to lose to the Los Angeles Rams in the NFC Divisional Playoff eight days later.
And so it remains that the 1985 Bears remain the only Super Bowl champion Bears team (though not the only champion Bears team) to this day. But fans always have hope.
