Owner Stan Kroenke, National Football League commissioner Roger Goodell and several team owners stuck a dagger through the heart of St. Louis Rams fans last week, as the team was handed back over to Los Angeles.

For Jim Nold of Columbia and other local supporters of the Rams, this loss is tough.

“We tailgated for a few years over by the Casino Queen and walked across the Eads Bridge, just using our vehicles,” Nold said. “Then, I got the opportunity to acquire this truck and have it all painted up in Rams colors. We moved it over to the St. Louis side for tailgating and we started doing that in about 2000.”

Nold and other friends, most notably, Joe Durako, took this self-proclaimed “Rambulance” to each and every Rams home game since that year. So, for eight Sundays each NFL season, Nold knew where he would be, and there were occasional Thursday or Monday night games as well…

Nold said he will now root for the Green Bay Packers “when he pays attention to the NFL,” because they are owned by the people and the community.

The Packers are the only community-owned franchise in United States professional sports.

Sundays will now be very different for Nold and other St. Louis Rams fans.

“It’s the biggest game there is, that’s why everybody loves it,” Nold said. “So, Sundays will be different. I sort of saw this coming when this came up a year or two ago and I kind of made up my mind that whatever was going to happen was going to be out of my control anyway, so whatever happens, happens.  Then, it became clear that (Kroenke) was going to move the team, so I wasn’t going to give him any more of my money — even if they stayed this next year. So, we’ll just move on with life. We’ll do other things.”

The Rambulance brought many people together, Nold said. They would use it to host a tailgate before each home game. It would be themed to the opponent’s city. If the Rams hosted the Chicago Bears, they would have Chicago music, food and cocktails.

“A friend of mine and I had tickets together. We had seven seats,” Nold said. “Then there were another 15 to 20 regulars who would come to the tailgates. Most of them had season tickets; some did, some didn’t. Some just came down to party with us. We had a regular group of people from St. Louis and from the east side. We had some folks from Waterloo, some from Belleville, Troy and Collinsville. All over. It was a regular group that got together for 15 years. Now, that group will really probably just drift apart.”

With a football void, those regular tailgaters may not see each other much, if at all, anymore.

“That’s kind of the unique thing about pro sports in general, pro football in particular. It can bring people together who would not normally socialize together from all levels and walks of life,” Nold said. “All races. It’s a beautiful thing and it won’t happen anymore — not around here, anyway.”

Before each tailgate, Nold would send out a group e-mail to many of the regular Rams tailgaters. It would say what the theme would be, or even just have a few of Nold’s thoughts on the Rams that week. When talk of the team possibly relocating gathered steam, Nold said he would write more to keep people updated. Nold had to give a goodbye to those people in this past week’s e-mail.

He ended his e-mail with an all caps, “LET’S GO BLUES!”

Nold said he had season tickets for both the St. Louis Cardinals and St. Louis Blues in the past, but it was tough to go to the amount of games each team hosts.

“I’m a very passionate Blues and Cardinals fan,” Nold said. “We’ve been fortunate to see the Cardinals have a lot of success. It’s been 48 years and counting now for the Blues and I’m hoping they can get over the hump and get us a Stanley Cup one of these days.”

As for the Rambulance, he doesn’t know what will happen to it yet.

“I haven’t really decided. It’s kind of up in the air,” Nold said. “It’s not something that I really use that much anyway. It stays parked and we used it eight times a year for the football games. We might do something different for the Blues and Cardinals. We might just donate it to somebody. I haven’t really decided yet.”

Although the Rambulance is now a thing of the past, the memories made on Sundays over the past 16 years will live on forever. Even Stan Kroenke can’t take those away.

Other locals joined in the frustration of losing their pro football team.

Longtime fan and past Rams season ticket holder Tim Meehan participated in a burning of fan gear outside of Outsiders Tavern in Waterloo last Wednesday.

An initial PSL holder, Meehan had season tickets through the 2014-15 season and even attended both Super Bowls the St. Louis Rams played in.

“The Rams just never connected with the city, and the last few years when Mr. Kroenke took over, it seemed he really didn’t care about the team,” Meehan told the Republic-Times. “You never saw him at the games or on the sidelines like other owners. It just seemed to me he bought this team and had full intent to move them from the get-go. He used them so he could get out to the L.A. area to develop.”

Meehan said he is more disappointed in the NFL for not following its own guidelines when it comes to relocation.

“I guess I am done with the NFL and the billionaires who run it,” he said.