Like many stories involving Carolina Panthers' owner Jerry Richardson, this one includes a handwritten note.

“He sent it to me in 1987,” team president Danny Morrison recalls.

“It said, ‘Danny: Confidential — Going after an NFL team for the Carolinas.’

“So I wrote him back immediately and said, ‘When you get your team, we want to be in the position to host training camp.’”

In the 29 years since that exchange, Morrison’s not only helped turn his alma mater into the Panthers’ temporary home, but he’s also spearheaded efforts to make Spartanburg a late-summer destination for fans across the Carolinas.

 

Records Shattered

 

It’s wild what’s happening at Wofford these days.

When the Panthers kicked off training camp on July 28, a record 22,455 fans packed Gibbs Stadium. That was nearly 30 percent of last year’s attendance total of 77,625. And that destroyed the previous record of 49,029 from 2014.

“Maybe the fans knew something we didn’t know,” Morrison says of last summer’s crowds.

But if those folks felt a Super Bowl trip coming, what do this year’s crowds know?

On Thursday — after just seven of the 14 practices scheduled in Spartanburg — a new record was set at 79,804. 13,544 more showed up Sunday, pushing the total to 93,348 with six practices to go.

One more group of numbers: Combine the attendance of the 17 previous camps the Spartanburg Convention and Visitors Bureau has on record — figures from 1995 and 1997-99 aren’t available — and you get 460,020, or an average of 27,060 per summer.

Year	Attendance	Year	Attendance
1995	n/a	2006	26,164
1996	10,309	2007	22,103
1997	n/a	2008	20,626
1998	n/a	2009	19,429
1999	n/a	2010	26,760
2000	10,371	2011	34,243
2001	8,217	2012	44,255
2002	10,112	2013	44,382
2003	11,516	2014	49,029
2004	23,785	2015	77,625
2005	21,094	2016	135,371

*THROUGH SUN., AUG. 7

Figures via the Spartanburg Convention and Visitors Bureau

If the current pace continues through Aug. 16, when the Panthers break camp, this year’s total will come in around 163,000.

It’s all a long way from the time Morrison worried he wouldn’t be able to back up his vow to Richardson.

 

Turning a Plan Into Reality

 

Morrison was in his second year as Wofford’s athletic director, when in 1986, the College began researching ways to improve the quality of life on campus. Athletics had plenty to gain with potential upgrades: a new football stadium; a weight room, meeting rooms and locker rooms for the football, basketball, soccer and baseball teams; and offices for the entire department.

Like most plans of its size, this one became stagnant. Then the NFL gave Richardson and the Carolinas a franchise in Oct. 1993.

“The wonderful news was that the needs for training camp mirrored the needs that we had identified in that ’86 plan,” Morrison says. “So here was a situation where you weren’t just doing something for the Panthers, you were doing things that you needed, anyway.”

But there was a catch.

Even with Richardson firmly behind the idea of holding training camp at his alma mater, everything had to be ready by July 1995. That gave Morrison just a year and a half to turn that initial plan from 1986 into a reality.

Nov. 1994: During Construction

Sept. 1996: After Construction

“Because of Mr. Richardson’s support, we had a competitive advantage — all things being equal,” Morrison says,” but we also knew that we had to deliver the appropriate facilities.”

So Morrison went to work raising funds while Wofford and Spartanburg began ironing out the logistics.

Somehow it all came together: the Richardson Building, Gibbs Stadium, multiple practice fields.

On July 14, 1995, the Panthers held their first ever training camp practice.

"Were you ever worried you weren’t going to get it done?," I ask Morrison.

“Oh, yeah,” he says with a smile, the relief still apparent after all these years later. “That would be accurate.”

New and Improved

 

20 years after that first camp, and now the team’s president, Morrison led a charge to spruce things up last summer. With the help of Lowe’s, the Panthers beautified the grounds around the practice fields by regrading and re-sodding the adjacent hill and adding lawn furniture, flowers and white picket fencing.

Efforts to improve the fan experience continued ahead of this year’s camp with added signage, a new paved sidewalk for fans to stand on while they hunt for autographs, free shuttles from off-campus parking lots and even more flowers.

“We want them to come here, and as they walk into training camp — just like as they walk up to Bank of America Stadium — you want the fan to feel like they’re at a special place,” Morrison says.

With teams trending back toward holding training camps at their main facilities, what the Panthers have at Wofford is becoming more unusual by the summer. Training camps on a college campus used to be a thing. Now Wofford is one of just 10 remaining holdouts.

A five-year extension signed in Feb. 2015 means the NFL will keep coming to Spartanburg through at least 2019. And if the Panthers continue along the path toward sustained success, this year’s record-shattering attendance figures may be broken many times over.

“There’s a difference in a winning team and a winning program,” Morrison says.

“I think when you’ve won back-to-back-to-back NFC South Division championships, and then you make a Super Bowl run, the cumulative effect of that manifests itself in these kind of attendance numbers.”