Virginia Halas, owner of the Chicago Bears and daughter of team founder George ‘Papa Bear’ Halas, has died. She was 102.
The Bears announced McCaskey’s death Thursday morning.
‘While we are sad, we are comforted knowing Virginia Halas McCaskey lived a long, full, faith-filled life and is now with the love of her life on earth,” the family said in a release from the team. “She guided the Bears for four decades and based every business decision on what was best for Bears players, coaches, staff and fans.”
NFL commissioner Roger Goodell said McCaskey left a legacy of ‘class, dignity and humanity.’
‘Faith, family, and football — in that order —– were her north stars and she lived by the simple adage to always ‘do the right thing,’’ Goodell said. ‘The Bears that her father started meant the world to her and he would be proud of the way she continued the family business with such dedication and passion.’
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McCaskey was born in Chicago in 1923 to Halas and his wife, Min, and was the couple’s oldest child and only daughter. She went to Drexel University, where she met her future husband, Edward McCaskey. The couple married in 1943 and lived out East for a few years before returning to Chicago in 1949.
While McCaskey was a stay-at-home mother, her husband began working with the Bears at his father-in-law’s request in 1967. But when her younger brother, George ‘Mugs’ Halas, died suddenly in 1979 and her father died in 1983, McCaskey found herself as the owner of the Bears.
‘She never sought the spotlight. She understood the importance of emphasizing to family members how important the legacy of the franchise was, not in terms of money or value, but in terms of what the team meant to people in Chicago and beyond,’ the team said in its statement.
McCaskey might have kept a low profile, but she was a passionate fan. After the Bears went 5-11 in 2014, leading to the dismissals of coach Marc Trestman and general manager Phil Emery, her son George, the Bears chairman, said McCaskey was ‘pissed off.’
‘At one point in our conversations, I asked her for her assessment of our season, and she said, as only a mother can, ‘I’m very, very disappointed,’” George McCaskey said then.
Though the Bears have been a disappointment in recent decades, McCaskey saw them reach the Super Bowl twice and win it all in the 1985 season. When the Bears beat the New Orleans Saints to make Super Bowl 41, McCaskey beamed as she accepted the George Halas Trophy, named for her father and given to the NFC champions.
‘It’s beautiful,’ she said at the time. ‘Just beautiful.’
McCaskey was a hands-off owner, leaving most decisions about the team to family members and trusted advisers. But even as the NFL became a multibillion dollar enterprise, she and the McCaskeys still saw the Bears as a team they had stewardship over more than owned. McCaskey grew close with several long-tenured players and their families, treating them as if they were her extended family.
In a tribute posted on X, Jarrett Payton, Pro Football Hall of Famer Walter Payton’s son, called McCaskey ‘one of the kindest, most loving, & thoughtful individuals I’ve ever had the privilege to meet.’
‘You always welcomed my family into yours with open arms, treating us as if we were your own,’ he wrote. ‘Our hearts are heavy, & our thoughts & prayers are with the entire McCaskey family during this difficult time,’ Payton said in the post, including a photo of him and McCaskey and another of the Bears matriarch with him, sister Brittney and their children.
McCaskey also was a driving force in the Bears’ charitable efforts. Bears Care, founded in 2005, has distributed more than $31.5 million to benefit education, youth sports, medical research and health awareness. She also supported several programs personally.
‘At the core of everything she did was Mrs. McCaskey’s faith. A devout Catholic, she always reflected on what God would want her to do in daily life,’ the team statement said. ‘She focused on trying to help encourage people to be better to one another and once stated she was always working on her faith through good times and bad.’
It’s not clear what will happen to the Bears with McCaskey’s death. Nine of McCaskey’s 11 children are still alive, and George McCaskey has been the team’s chairman since 2011. McCaskey also had 21 grandchildren, 40 great-grandchildren and four great-great-grandchildren.