From Bart Starr plunging across the goal line on a fourth-and-goal in the Ice Bowl to win the NFL Championship to Al Harris intercepting Matt Hasselbeck in overtime to in the first round of the playoffs, Lambeau Field has always had an aura about it.

Built in 1957, Lambeau has been the home of the Packers after the team moved out of the old City Stadium. You can feel the presence of the stadium when you’re near it; when you walk into the bowl, you get the sense that you’re a part of history.

You can almost see coach Vince Lombardi patrolling the sidelines with his fedora, screaming “WHAT THE HELL IS GOING ON OUT THERE!!” Some of the greatest players in the history of the game have called Lambeau home. From Starr and Paul Hornung, to Brett Favre and Reggie White, to Jim Taylor and Forrest Gregg to Willie Davis and Jim Ringo, you’ll be hard pressed to find a stadium where more legendary players played.

The mystique of Lambeau Field comes from the not only from the legendary players, games and moments that have taken part in the Packers’ history but also the relationship between team, fans and community.

The franchise began in 1919 and was owned by the public through stock. The franchise remains as the only publicly owned team in professional sports, with 112,015 owners of stock in the team.

Why would anyone pay $200 per share of a stock that never appreciates or pays out? The answer is fans take pride in the fact that they can truthfully say that they helped bring players to Green Bay.

In 1998, the year of the last time you could buy stock in the team, fans spent $24 million that went straight to the team. You know that a franchise is truly part of a community when its President and CEO, Bob Harlan, answers his own telephone to talk to fans and listen to their concerns.

Not to mention he also owns exactly one share in the team, much like most of the shareholders. When the team on the field is there because of the fans in the stands you know there’s a special relationship.

The passion of Packers fans is unmatched by any fan you’ll ever find on this planet. What other team could survive in a small city of only 100,000?

All other teams in the NFL are located in major U.S. cities but most haven’t experienced near the amount of success as the Packers have over the years. Twelve championships, more than any other franchise, 26 Hall of Fame players and one city that knows nothing but Packer football.

Every single game at the legendary Lambeau Field since 1960 has been sold out. That’s 269 straight sell outs, many of those coming while the Packers posted losing records. The season ticket waiting list is 76,800 deep. If you were to add your name to the list today that means you’d be waiting about 1,600 years for your tickets.

Lambeau Field is named after Curly Lambeau, the team’s founder, coach and player for the Packers. Curly led the Packers to six championships in a span of 15 years. The stadium name still stands as simply Lambeau Field, one of the few stadiums in the country that is not named after a corporate sponsor.

There’s something about walking through the gates of Lambeau Field that can’t be matched. Walking into the stadium and seeing legendary names such as Bart Starr, Vince Lombardi, Ray Nitschke and Reggie White can make anyone shiver knowing that this is the very same field that such legends played on.

Like any franchise, Green Bay has had its fair share of up and down years. The difference in Green Bay is that no matter how the team is faring on the field, the fans dedication and love for the team never wavers. Packer finds stand behind their team 100 percent of the time.

This is reason enough to know that even though the team has merely a 36-21 record at home over the past six seasons, not bad but not necessarily up to the standards that could be accomplished, the mystique of Lambeau doesn’t necessarily lie in only the stadium or on the field often referred to as the frozen tundra, but in the bond that is created between fan, team, history and stadium when all are brought together every Sunday during the football season.

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