by Sam Hatcher
Clemson, Cumberland University, Kentucky, LSU, Mercer, Mississippi, Mississippi State, Southwestern Presbyterian, Tennessee, Texas, Tulane, and the University of Nashville enlisted in 1895.
The conference mission statement announced it was created for “the development and purification of college athletics throughout the South.”
Among other member schools in later years were Centenary, Centre, Chattanooga, The Citadel, Dahlonega (North Georgia), Davidson, Delta State, Eastern Kentucky, Emory and Henry, Erskine, Florida, Furman, Georgetown (Kentucky), Gordon Military College, Howard College (Samford), Jacksonville State (Alabama), Kentucky Wesleyan, Louisiana College, Louisiana Tech, Louisville, Loyola (New Orleans), Memphis State, Memphis University School, Miami, Middle Tennessee, Millsaps College, Morehead State (Kentucky), Newberry, Northwestern State (Louisiana), Oglethorpe, Presbyterian (South Carolina), Rollins, Southern (Florida), Southern Mississippi, Southern University (Alabama), Southwestern Presbyterian (Rhodes, Memphis), Southwestern Louisiana, Spring Hill (Alabama), Stetson, Tampa, Tennessee Tech, Transylvania (Kentucky), Trinity College (Duke), Troy State, Tulane, Union (Kentucky), Western Kentucky, and Wofford.
Traveling from one city to another was not always convenient. If a team had a road trip in south Alabama for example, it might schedule a game against the University of Alabama in Tuscaloosa on Friday and play Auburn Saturday before returning home.
A team’s football season during this era might include as few as six games and as many as eight or nine.
George gets called in
Before the university announced its plans and acknowledged a forecast that would surely create a tsunami-sized negative reaction among students, President Hill called George into his office and articulated why Cumberland’s football program was about to be drop-kicked into the dustbin of history.
Hill reasoned that Cumberland teams had not been competitive in recent years and that the school didn’t have a sufficient recruiting plan to attract good players. The University needed to focus on academics and the law school and not extra-curricular affairs. Finally and of most importance, football was being quashed because the school was financially strapped and needed every cent possible to continue operations.
Cumberland, unlike its Ivy League rivals and area state schools, had never had a substantial endowment or other financial reservoirs from which to draw. For the most part Cumberland relied on student tuition to pay its bills.
George listened carefully as Hill defended the school’s decision and accepted the outcome without favor but with understanding.
His role now, in the sight of administration, was to serve as messenger and mediator to the student body. The administration would make the announcement but was leaning heavily upon George’s skill to keep the peace with his peers.
Mulling over how best to break such negative news, George had ideas.
First, he could state the decision made to dismiss the football program was made solely in the best interest of Cumberland’s students. To keep the University’s academics intact, sacrifices had to be made.
Second, George would deploy a diversionary tactic by telling his classmates, “We still have baseball, and Saturday we’re going to whip the heck out of Georgia Tech’s rambling wreck.”
Little did the young law school student realize, but he was taking the first step to wake up a sleeping giant.
Working his classmates and fraternity brothers into a frenzy for a baseball game against Georgia Tech seemed like a good strategy for the moment, but who knew what lay ahead come fall.
From one dormitory to another and at each frat house and sorority gathering, George made ballyhoo over the upcoming “whupping” he had planned for Georgia Tech on the baseball diamond.
A pep rally was slated for Thursday, followed by a “get ready for the big game” party on Friday night at Horn Springs.
The Cumberland baseball schedule in the spring of 1916 featured the likes of Alabama, Vanderbilt, Sewanee, Kentucky, Maryville, Middle Tennessee State, and a couple of games with a few Nashville semi-pro teams.
An excerpt from the school yearbook described Cumberland’s baseball team as “very promising.”
The annual read: “Overlooking the loss of Turner and Collins to Jersey City, Cumberland still has a chance to win the honor she has always won in the game. On the mound are Bohanon, Thweatt, Estes and Bradshaw, any of who can meet and beat any college team on our schedule.”
Drinking George’s Kool-Aid
Among his multiple roles on campus, George served as the baseball team’s student manager, a job that in these times was similar to that of athletic directors in later decades.
That meant he did it all including scheduling the games. He was so adept at what he did that the only thing baseball coach Peck Turner had to do was make out the lineup and coach his team.
All the hoopla George had stirred on campus about the weekend game against Tech was beginning to take the shape of a seventh game in the World Series. It was purely coincidental that the opposing nine played for Georgia Tech.
Come Friday, P.T. Barnum himself could not have done a more glorious job than George in creating what was now a circus-like environment among students and townspeople. The game had become the talk of the town, especially around the square.
Inside the Devil’s Elbow, a sudsy beer-drinking haven for Cumberland students in the northwest corner of Lebanon’s Public Square, bets were being made. The odds weren’t about whether or not Cumberland would win the game but rather about how badly the Bulldogs would beat Tech.
A number of stores were announcing that they would close early Saturday as they anticipated there wouldn’t be many customers with so many folks headed to the game, including many of the merchants themselves and their employees.
Signs encouraging the Cumberland team were posted in store windows, while posters were nailed to utility poles and stapled on tobacco sticks planted in front yards.
Saturday was going to be a day to beat the band, and George was beginning to feel the pressure.
Cumberland’s got to win this game he told to himself. “If we don’t, I’m the guy they’re going to come looking for,” he muttered beneath his breath.
Hmm, thought George, “What I need is some sort of insurance policy. Better yet a guarantee.”
A rascally smile crossed his face, and George began to walk rapidly to the wooden garage that housed his 1913 Chevrolet Series C Classic Six auto. It was time for a quick solo trip into Nashville.
1913 Chevy
He couldn’t afford to be gone long or he would be missed, and he couldn’t take a passenger as he was on a top-secret mission of graveyard magnitude and didn’t need any witnesses.
By noon, George was pounding the sidewalks of Nashville, visiting saloons where he knew he could find some of the city’s best semi-professional baseball players, men who, under the right circumstances, might be willing to commit to a Saturday afternoon of competitive baseball in Lebanon.
His prowess to seek and find was an attribute he claimed from his DNA. George’s father was a noted scout for Confederate General Nathan Bedford Forrest during the Civil War.
Within two hours he had signed on three hitters with better than .350 batting averages, a pitcher with the reputation of hurling unhittable fast balls and two flawless-fielding middle infielders.
What would be their payola for one day of baseball in a Cumberland uniform?
The manager promised a lively Friday night party at Horn Springs, a bevy of gorgeous coeds, all the beer they could drink, travel expenses, and, best of all, the opportunity to beat one of the nation’s greatest coaches, John Heisman, and his nationally-ranked Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets.
The rapid sale, one of George’s fortes, proved simple. The professionals were eager to follow him back to Lebanon for an all-night soiree beside the magical springs. And George had his insurance to cover his baseball diamond. It was a solid package deal, one good for all parties concerned.
/> In the early years of the twentieth century, the college athletics rulebook was loosie-goosie at best. Teams were allowed to add players at the drop of a pop-up fly ball as college baseball was treated more or less like a backyard pick-up game. While adding professional players to the lineup may have been viewed as taking it a step too far, it wasn’t anything that hadn’t been done by numerous other schools.
HORN SPRINGS RESORT
* * *
Founded in 1870, Horn Springs was a popular resort near Lebanon. Its reputation sprouted after the Horn family discovered a spring on the property that provided a special mineral water reported to cure a variety of ills. The water was bottled and sold, while guests could also soak in special baths offered at the spring spa. Besides a hotel, the facilities included a restaurant, dance hall and outdoor entertainment options. Tourists from across the South frequented Horn Springs, often arriving by passenger rail service.
Back on campus, George could take a deep breath and relax. He reported to Coach Turner that he had recruited a few extra players for the big game and counseled that they needed to be in the starting lineup if he wanted to have any sort of chance to beat Heisman’s superior Tech team.
Saturday morning showed the beginning of a gorgeous spring day. Temperatures were expected to hit the mid-70s by game time.
Fans of the great American pastime began gathering a full hour before the first pitch. Women toted picnic baskets brimming with good eats. Small children dove into playing games in the dirt behind the bleachers, while townsfolk and hundreds of Cumberland students filled the wooden bleachers.
Horn Springs was a popular weekend resort during the early 1900s near Lebanon, Tennessee
Meanwhile, Georgia Tech coach John Heisman, already a legend in the minds of many a sportswriter, readied his squad for the contest and cast a careful eye toward the Cumberland players. This was not his first rumble with Cumberland.
Thirteen years earlier, when he was head coach of the Clemson football team, Heisman met Cumberland on Thanksgiving Day in the inaugural Southern Conference championship game in Montgomery, Alabama.
Both schools had managed winning records during the regular season that ended a couple of weeks earlier. Playing against ranked teams, the two were recognized by sports columnists and national sports publications as two of the nation’s top football teams.
Going into the November 26 championship game, Clemson boasted a 4–1 record with victories over Georgia, North Carolina A&M, and Davidson. Their solitary loss was an 11–6 decision against North Carolina.
Cumberland also held a 4–1 record with impressive wins over Vanderbilt, Alabama, LSU and Tulane. Regarded as one of Cumberland’s best teams ever, the Bulldogs had outscored opponents in the four wins by a combined 119–0. Their only loss, a 6–0 defeat, came at the hands of the University of the South at Sewanee.
While the two teams played to an 11–11 tie on this late November day, Heisman got a bird’s-eye view of this small Tennessee school’s tenacity and acumen on the playing field. Cumberland outplayed Clemson in the first half, scoring 11 points and keeping the Tigers scoreless.
Clemson came back in the second half, matching the score with 11 points, and the game ended tied in a knot. So both teams shared the coveted Southern Championship title.
It was the final game Heisman captained at Clemson. But it would not be his last football game to coach against Cumberland, and he did not like the idea of sharing a title.
Batter-up
It was time to play ball.
George, in his role as baseball team manager, had done all that he could to ensure a victory. Winning the game at this point was in the hands of Coach Turner, the semi-pro players from Nashville, and the legitimate Cumberland players who had done quite well for themselves during the earlier part of the season.
The home team fans and students wanted to beat Heisman because of his notoriety and the acclaim he had received from the national press. It was turning out to be more of a case of Cumberland seeking to beat the man behind the team, Coach Heisman, rather than simply beating Georgia Tech.
Heisman had already made his mark as a coach by boasting winning records in two sports at Buchtel and Clemson before arriving at Tech. A household name, the coach was considered the best of the best.
Before he concluded his career, Heisman would mastermind football teams at eight schools including Oberlin College, Buchtel College (now University of Akron), Auburn, Clemson, Georgia Tech, University of Pennsylvania, Washington and Jefferson College, and Rice. As a head football coach for thirty-five years, from 1892 to 1927 he compiled a record of 186 wins, 70 defeats, and 18 ties.
His winning slate in baseball proved equally impressive at 219–119–7.
Off to another strong start with his Yellow Jackets baseball team, Heisman knew a win over a solid Cumberland team would bolster Tech’s ranking in the national polls. He yearned to win this match as fervently as George Allen and the Cumberland crowd.
Heisman’s expectations in everything he did was to be the best. Whether it be football, basketball (he coached Tech’s basketball team for two years), or baseball, he wanted to be Number One.
Winning may not have meant everything, but Heisman had a difficult time explaining to his players how anything could be gained by losing.
He reminded his players frequently of that fact and that they must do their job and stay focused and disciplined at all times.
Coach Heisman admonished the Tech squads he coached, “Gentlemen, it is better to have died as a small boy than to fumble this football.”
It was his way of driving home the point to not make unforced errors. He looked upon mistakes made on the football field as a case of players simply not thinking, thus among the gravest of errors in his eyes.
He would not tolerate a lack of focus, minimal effort, or any other personal failure on the part of an individual player that contributed to a loss.
That’s why on this day he was shocked.
Georgia Tech was shut out.
Meanwhile, the Cumberland Bulldogs were on fire.
A myriad of more than three dozen hits including a half-dozen home runs sealed the win.
After nine innings Cumberland had demolished Heisman’s nationally-ranked Tech team by a score of twenty-two to nothing.
The legendary coach was embarrassed at his team’s sound defeat, and he wanted an explanation.
Heisman begins his probe
Coach Heisman gathered his players before for the long trip back to Atlanta. He was still trying to understand how such a defeat could have been thrust upon his talented Georgia Tech team.
As he began to ask about some of Cumberland’s star players of the game, he soon realized he had been duped. Cumberland and their handful of ringers had taken his boys to the woodshed for a shellacking
Heisman was furious. He knew Cumberland’s tactics were not honorable, nonetheless, the record book showed the result as a loss for Tech. George Allen’s shenanigans potentially could cost John Heisman a national championship in baseball.
As he turned to leave the playing field, Coach Heisman threw a final glance across the diamond with but one emotion branded in his mind: revenge.
But at this time he could not imagine where he would get the opportunity.
Cumberland and Tech could meet in a baseball game somewhere down the road, but it was not likely. And there was no chance his football squad would collide with the lowly Bulldogs, now one of the weakest teams in the South.
After the game
George hung around the field after the big win. He paid the promised travel expenses to the semi-pro players, congratulated Coach Turner and the real Cumberland players, and shook hands with folks in the crowd as he received countless pats on the back while mingling with the crowd that didn’t want the happy mood come to an end.
And for good reason.
The hometown school had handed John Heisman and Georgia Tech the worst defeat that he and Tech had ever experienced
on a baseball diamond.
Many newspapers across America carried the story over the following days. Some held forty-eight point headlines proclaiming how Cumberland had man handled the highly-ranked Engineers. Sports columnists speculated on what could have happened in Lebanon to permit such a defeat, as the Tech team dropped from the list of top baseball teams in the nation.
While Heisman held not a clue as to how he would get even, he knew that somehow, some day he would get payback. Seething after the game, he did not refrain in letting Cumberland officials, coaches and others know how he felt, especially George Allen.
George viewed the great man’s threats and emotions as hollow. After all what could this coaching icon do to harm Cumberland University? The game was in the books and that was the end of it.
A few days later
Life on campus returned to normal after the weekend of celebrated match.
There wasn’t much activity on Sunday because of Blue Laws, which meant restaurants, businesses, especially saloons and taverns, and even the moving picture theater on the public square were closed. The most excitement took place inside local churches after the final prayer as parishioners whispered across the pews about the big game.
On Monday when businesses sprang back to life, the conversation continued in stores, lawyers’ offices, the courthouse and around the square. Chatter drifted from the coverage of the game in the Sunday Nashville Tennessean to whether or not Tech might fire Heisman for being on the wrong side of such a one-sided game.
George Allen (seated at far right) on yacht with President Truman
And while Cumberland’s Coach Turner received a considerable amount of credit for the win, George was the man of the hour, a big man on and off campus.