Ex-Steeler From Simsbury Headed For "Immaculate Reception" Reunion

SIMSBURY, CT — The upcoming weekend was to be a joyous celebration of the golden anniversary of one of the wildest finishes ever to a National Football League playoff game, a touchdown pass dubbed "The Immaculate Reception," deemed the greatest in NFL history and one which made Pittsburgh Steelers rookie running back Franco Harris a household name and nearly made West Simsbury resident Barry Pearson famous.

Pearson, 72, and his wife Linda divide their time between Connecticut and Florida. He was headed to an airport in the Sunshine State Wednesday morning, bound for Pittsburgh for a weekend of events celebrating the famous play, when he got the unexpected news that Harris, a member of the Pro Football Hall of Fame, had died overnight.

"Shocked," was all Pearson could say, adding he didn't know anything yet about the circumstances of Harris' death. He said about two dozen members of the 1972 team were expected for the reunion, with plans for the weekend including a panel discussion and on-field acknowledgement of the players, wearing their jerseys.

The Steelers had planned to retire Harris' jersey number 32 at Acrisure Stadium at halftime of their game against the Las Vegas Raiders Saturday night. Friday marks the actual anniversary of the historic play, which took place at Three Rivers Stadium on Dec. 23, 1972 against the Raiders, then based in Oakland.

In an interview with Patch several years ago, Pearson, an undrafted rookie free agent out of Northwestern University, recalled how he spent the entire 1972 season on the Steelers' taxi squad (today called the practice squad).

"I’d practice with the team every day during the week, and then would sit in the stands during the games," he recounted.

His break came when Frank Lewis, one of the team’s top two receivers, was injured during the final regular season matchup against San Diego. With a first-round playoff game against Oakland looming just six days later, Pearson was elevated to the active roster.

Wearing number 83, his NFL debut consisted of playing on the special teams during kicking plays. He did not enter the offensive lineup until 22 seconds remained in the fourth quarter, with Pittsburgh trailing 7-6 and facing a 4th-and-10 at their own 40-yard line.

In the huddle, Pearson conveyed the play called by coach Chuck Noll to quarterback Terry Bradshaw: a 12-yard crossing pattern intended for Pearson, with hopes of then getting out of bounds to stop the clock and give the Steelers at least one more chance at pulling out a victory.

As Pearson crossed the field in position to make a catch, covered by Hall of Fame defensive back Willie Brown, Bradshaw faced heavy pressure from Oakland linemen Horace Jones and Tony Cline. He scrambled to escape their clutches, breaking up the diagrammed play, and heaved the ball downfield toward running back John "Frenchy" Fuqua.

In a sequence that is still hotly debated to this day, the ball caromed off either Fuqua or Raider defensive back Jack Tatum (or both, as many argue). Out of nowhere, Harris snared the ricocheted ball and rumbled down the left sideline, eluding defensive back Jimmy Warren for a Pittsburgh touchdown with five seconds remaining, providing a shocking 13-7 victory and a trip to the American Football Conference championship game.

"All of a sudden I looked and saw Franco running in with the ball," said Pearson, who was the second player to reach Harris in the back of the end zone, after fellow receiver Ronnie Shanklin.

The original broadcast on NBC may be viewed on YouTube here; a rarely-seen bird's-eye coaches' film of the historic play is shown below.

The "Immaculate Reception" made instant celebrities of both Harris and Bradshaw, who would both find their way to the Pro Football Hall of Fame. A number of other people involved in that memorable game, including Noll, Raider coach John Madden and quarterback Ken Stabler, and Steelers "Mean" Joe Greene and Jack Ham, also eventually wound up enshrined in Canton.

But what became of Pearson, the man for whom the play had been designed?

In his first full active season in 1973, he caught 23 passes for 317 yards, a 13.8 average, and three touchdowns. His first scoring pass, a 46-yarder from backup quarterback Joe Gilliam, proved to be the winning points in a 21-16 win over defending Super Bowl runner-up Washington on Monday Night Football on Nov. 5, 1973.

In a playoff rematch with Oakland, he caught a 4-yard touchdown pass from Bradshaw in the second quarter, but the Raiders prevailed, 33-14.

Prior to the 1974 season, the Steelers drafted a pair of future Hall of Fame wide receivers, Lynn Swann and John Stallworth. With Lewis and Shanklin still on the team, Pearson was deemed expendable and was traded to the Kansas City Chiefs for a conditional sixth-round draft pick.

"By conditional, it meant if I played at least half the time, the Steelers would get a sixth-round pick; if I didn’t, they would get an eighth-round pick," Pearson recalled. "Needless to say, I only played part-time that season; they really didn’t want to give up that sixth-rounder."

Despite starting only five games under future Hall of Fame head coach Hank Stram, Pearson improved his numbers from the previous year, grabbing 27 passes for 387 yards, a 14.3 yards-per-catch average. He also scored a touchdown, ironically against the Steelers.

Finally installed as a starter in 1975, Pearson produced his best offensive season, catching 36 passes for 608 yards (a 16.9 yards-per-reception average) and three touchdowns. Two of those scoring passes came from the arm of Len Dawson, in the final season of a 19-year career that also landed him in the Hall of Fame.

During training camp at William Jewell College in the summer of 1976, Pearson sustained an injury and played sparingly that season. After an unsuccessful attempt to come back in 1977, he retired from pro football at age 27.

He served as receivers coach at Oklahoma State University in 1979, under first-year head coach and future Super Bowl champion and Pro Football Hall of Famer Jimmy Johnson. After that year, he had an unsuccessful interview with the NFL’s Detroit Lions, then returned to Connecticut and began a new career with a food distributor, the Hartford Provision Company, owned by his wife’s family.

Pearson worked his way up through the ranks, eventually becoming president and CEO, a position he held for 20 years. After 35 years with the company, including overseeing a major relocation to a state-of-the-art facility in South Windsor and a name change to HPC Foodservice, he retired in late 2015.

Pearson’s hometown of Geneseo, Illinois honored him with induction into its Hall of Fame in 2013.