Barrel Man
Denver BroncosSometimes, your 15 minutes of fame trigger a lifetime of recognition, as in the case of Tim McKernan, who bet his brother $10 that donning a barrel would get him on TV. In 1977, he debuted his namesake, held up only by suspenders on his bare chest (what was under the barrel remains a mystery). For 30 years, he rallied Broncos fans through all kinds of Rocky Mountain weather, megaphone in hand. “Outside the barrel, my father was an introverted, calm person,” Tim’s son observed. “But when he put it on, he… swaggered and was transformed. It allowed him to express himself.”
Painted like a soda can, a nod to the “Orange Crush” defense that captured the 1977 AFC title, the barrel evoked Denver’s past: a down-on-his luck miner who’d lost his stake to whiskey and women, left with only a barrel to his name. In 1998, 49 Broncos autographed the Super Bowl XXXII-winning barrel. Upon selling it, Barrel Man donated a portion of the proceeds to Jubilee House, a battered womens’ shelter.