The Opening Kickoff

by Dave Revsine

  78. “. . . quadrupled the space.”: William Henry Nugent, “The Sports Section,” American Mercury (March 1929), 336.

  78. “. . . was simply a beneficiary.”: Michael Oriard, Reading Football: How the Popular Press Created an American Spectacle (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1993), 60.

  78. “football was simply available for promotion.”: Ibid., 70.

  79. “. . . emulate the social elite.”: Ibid., 61.

  79. than actually see it: Ibid.

  79. “. . . on professional football in the 1950s and 1960s.”: Ibid., 57.

  80. “. . . were greatly pleased.”: Lewis, 118.

  80. more than 1,800 by 1900: James Playsted Wood, Magazines in the United States (New York: Ronald, 1956), 99–100, 103.

  80. nearly 300 percent: Frank Presbrey, The History and Development of Advertising (Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1929), 353.

  80. “. . . and cut recitations.”: Richard Harding Davis, “The Story of Two Collegains,” Harper’s Weekly, July 4, 1891.

  80. “. . . strength of a gentleman.”: Ibid.

  80. “. . . of the 1890s.”: Oriard, 187.

  Chapter 9

  82. on the Badgers’ prospects: “Football Prospects,” Milwaukee Sentinel, September 27, 1897, 2.

  82. “. . . remains somewhat problematical.”: Roy L. Foley, “Willie Hoppe Had Nothing on O’Dea Putting ‘English’ on Ball,” Wisconsin News, December 1, 1934, 12.

  82. one that now appeared “strong.”: “All O.K. at Madison,” Minneapolis Journal, October 2, 1897.

  83. “. . . solved the fullback problem for Wisconsin.”: Ibid.

  83. basic tackling techniques: “Battle for Victory,” Daily Cardinal, September 29, 1897, 1.

  83. “. . . invited his charges to throw him.”: “Great Day at Hand,” Minneapolis Journal, October 28, 1897.

  83. “. . . with the armor used.”: Ibid.

  83. “plan worked admirably.”: Ibid.

  84. “Play up sharp, Charley!”: John Stuart Martin, “Walter Camp and His Gridiron Game,” American Hertiage 12, no. 6 (October 1961).

  84. who would carry the ball: Alexander M.Weyand, The Saga of American Football (New York: Macmillan, 1955), 33.

  84. a part of the varsity team: Amos Alonzo Stagg and Wesley Winans Stout, Touchdown! (New York: Longmans, Green and Co., 1927), 125.

  84. “. . . in mental arithmetic.”: Ibid., 127.

  84. look slow by comparison: For a rough idea of what the game looked like, see www.youtube.com/watch?v=YHBNu-qzGNE.

  85. “Pat O’Dea is a wonderful kicker.”: “Train Up Kickers,” Chicago Daily Tribune, October 4, 1897, 4.

  85. “. . . to achieve this end.”: “Is Wisconsin to Win?” Daily Cardinal, October 27, 1897, 1.

  85. “. . . than it did a week ago.”: “Same Story over Again,” Daily Cardinal, October 26, 1897, 2.

  85. “. . . towards the Varsity eleven.”: “Is Wisconsin to Win?” Daily Cardinal, October 27, 1897, 1.

  85–86. “. . . in the Old Town Tonight.”: Ibid.

  86. those didn’t catch on: Ibid., and “The Cheers and Songs,” (Milwaukee) Sunday Sentinel, October 31, 1897, Part Four, 1.

  86. team marched in single file: “ ’Twas the Best of All,” Daily Cardinal, October 28, 1897, 1.

  86. “. . . to win the game!”: Pyre’s speech is paraphrased from ibid. Pyre “reviewed the team in a rapid manner, concluding with O’Dea, of whom he said that it would not be necessary for Wisconsin to make any touchdowns, since he alone could kick enough goals from the field to win the game.”

  87. “. . . forgive all his shortcomings.”: “Great Day at Hand,” Minneapolis Journal, October 28, 1897.

  87. fifteen players apiece: “A Royal Send-Off,” Daily Cardinal, October 29, 1897, 1.

  87. “the West Hotel in downtown Minneapolis: Wisconsin 39, Minnesota 0, October 30, 1897. Descriptions of the game taken from “O’Dea’s Great Kick,” (Milwaukee) Sunday Sentinel, October 31, 1897, 1; Dick Hyland, “The Hyland Fling,” Los Angeles Times, February 6, 1949, 26; “Mourning at the U,” Saint Paul Globe, October 31, 1897, 9; “Gophers’ Waterloo,” Chicago Daily Tribune, October 31, 1897, 5; and Roy L. Foley, “Pat O’Dea Disclaims Playing Hero’s Role,” Wisconsin News, 1934, excerpted from chapter two of Foley’s twelve-chapter series on O’Dea.

  88. not a recent phenomenon: “O’Dea’s Great Kick,” (Milwaukee) Sunday Sentinel, October 31, 1897, 1.

  88. “. . . a deaf and dumb man at a singing school.”: Ibid.

  88. “. . . a belligerent German at an Irish picnic.”: Ibid.

  88. “the really great spectacular event of the contest.”: Ibid.

  89. “. . . shot by rule and line.”: Ibid. In the original source of this quotation, the word “straight” appears as “straigth.” For purposes of clarity, I have corrected the typographical error.

  89. twirled himself completely around: “Mourning at the U,” Saint Paul Globe, October 31, 1897, 9.

  89. “. . . 40 yards out on the dead run.”: Dick Hyland, “The Hyland Fling,” Los Angeles Times, February 6, 1949, 26.

  89. “. . . O’Dea got it off.”: Ibid. In the original source of this quotation, the word “when” appears as “whe.” For purposes of clarity, I have corrected the typographical error.

  89. rectified by game time: “Is Wisconsin to Win?” Daily Cardinal, October 7, 1948, 1.

  89. “. . . rustle the maples that day.”: Prescott Sullivan, “The Low Down,” San Francisco Chronicle, October 7, 1898.

  90. “. . . Ain’t this a good enough game?”: “Mourning at the U,” Saint Paul Globe, October 31, 1897, 9.

  90. “. . . other things than punt.”: “O’Dea’s Great Kick,” (Milwaukee) Sunday Sentinel, October 31, 1897, 1.

  90. “. . . pleased the watching thousands.”: “Gophers’ Waterloo,” Chicago Daily Tribune, October 31, 1897, 5.

  90. “. . . even for a single minute.”: “O’Dea’s Great Kick,” (Milwaukee) Sunday Sentinel, October 31, 1897, 1.

  90. “. . . against Minnesota in a football game.”: “Struggles of Past Years,” (Milwaukee) Sunday Sentinel, October 31, 1897, Part Four, 1.

  91. red-clad revelers: “O’Dea’s Great Kick,” (Milwaukee) Sunday Sentinel, October 31, 1897, 1.

  91. less than musical, din: “Madison Goes Wild,” (Milwaukee) Sunday Sentinel, October 31, 1897, Part Four, 1.

  91. well into the evening: “A Grand Celebration,” Daily Cardinal, November 1, 1897, 1.

  91. “waiting to glimpse the kicking kangaroo.”: Roy L. Foley, “Pat O’Dea Disclaims Playing Hero’s Role,” Wisconsin News, 1934, excerpted from chapter two of Foley’s twelve-chapter series on O’Dea, unknown date.

  91. “. . . lusty Wisconsin yells.”: “A Grand Celebration,” Daily Cardinal, November 1, 1897, 1.

  92. slowly began to drift home: Ibid.

  Chapter 10

  93. “. . . occurred in the South.”: “Virginia vs. Georgia,” Red and Black, October 30, 1897, 1.

  93. “. . . to win or die.”: Ibid.

  93. into the line: Christopher C. Meyers, “ ‘Unrelenting War on Football’: The Death of Richard Von Gammon and the Attempt to Ban Football in Georgia,” Georgia Historical Quarterly 93, no. 4 (Winter 2009), 388–407.

  94. “. . . tripped and fell on him.”: Atlanta Journal, November 1, 1897, as quoted in Meyers.

  94. “. . . got out of humor.”: George Magruder Battey, A History of Rome and Floyd County, State of Georgia, United States of America: Including Numerous Incidents of More than Local Interest, 1540–1922 (Atlanta: Webb and Vary, 1922), 345.

  94. mitts and football equipment: Ibid., 344.

  94. Daughters of the Confederacy: “Gammon of the Georgia,” Macon Telegraph, October 31, 1897, 18.

  94. freshly prepared sweets:
Battey, 344.

  94. the tree was spared: Ibid., 348.

  95. to a nearby hospital: “A Fatal Game in Atlanta,” New York Times, October 31, 1897.

  95. father at his side: Battey, 346.

  95. disband the University of Georgia football team: “Colleges and Football,” Macon Telegraph, November 2, 1897, 6.

  95. signature to become law: Cal Powell, “The Day One Woman Saved Football,” Red and Black, October 30, 1997, 1.

  95. “. . . a great American game.”: All quotes in this paragraph from Meyers.

  95. “. . . object of his life.”: Ibid., Powell.

  96. “. . . principle of our government.”: Meyers.

  96. “The Woman Who Saved Southern Football.”: Ernie Harwell, “How a Woman Saved Southern Football,” Saturday Evening Post, October 14, 1944.

  97. “. . . for they did not beat Yale.”: Ralph J. Findlay, “The Abuses of Training,” Harvard Graduates’ Magazine (March 1894), 322–28.

  97. “. . . eleven other youths dressed in blue.”: Frank W. Taussig, “A Professor’s View of Athletics,” Harvard Graduates’ Magazine (March 1895), 308–9.

  97. “the ever present liability to death on the field.”: “President Eliot’s Report,” Harvard Graduates’ Magazine (March 1895), 367.

  97. “. . . gamblers and rowdies all contribute.”: Ibid.

  97. “There’s murder in that game.”: Amos Alonzo Stagg and Wesley Winans Stout, Touchdown! (New York: Longmans, Green and Co., 1927), 91.

  98. to ban the game: Albert Bushnell Hart, “The Documents of the Football Question,” Harvard Graduates’ Magazine (June 1895), 519–27.

  98. “. . . the main purpose of college life.”: Ibid.

  98. the game should and would continue: Ibid.

  98. “. . . because the risk exists.”: Theodore Roosevelt, “Value of an Athletic Training,” Harper’s Weekly, December 23, 1893, 1236.

  98. “. . . than give it up.”: Theodore Roosevelt to Walter Camp, March 11, 1895, Walter Chauncey Camp Papers, box 21, folder 593, Yale University Archives.

  98. “. . . for being world-conquerors.”: “Commencement. —The Alumni Dinner. Senator Lodge,” Harvard Graduates’ Magazine (September 1896), 66.

  99. the rise of bare-knuckle boxing: Elliott Gorn, The Manly Art: Bare-Knuckle Prize Fighting in America (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1986), 192, as quoted in Michael Kimmel, Manhood in America: A Cultural History (New York: Free Press, 1996), 118.

  99. “. . . that is what I want to preserve.”: Henry James, The Bostonians (New York: Modern Library, 2003), 325–26.

  99. “. . . conquests on the gridiron.”: Stephen Ducat, The Wimp Factor: Gender Gaps, Holy Wars, and the Politics of Anxious Masculinity (Boston: Beacon Press, 2004), 75.

  99. “. . . hit the line hard!”: Theodore Roosevelt, The Strenuous Life (New York: Review of Reviews, 1904), 137.

  100. “. . . vigorous and unsullied manhood,”: John Sayle Watterson, College Football: History, Spectacle, Controversy (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2000), 42. Article is clipped, without specifying origins in University of Chicago Archives, PDF file ofcpreshjb-0020-0080-01.pdf.

  100. “. . . all other agencies combined.”: Ibid.

  100. “. . . all the letters received . . . are printed.”: Walter Camp, Football Facts and Figures. A Symposium of Expert Opinions on the Game’s Place in American Athletics (New York: Harper & Brothers, 1894), viii.

  100. responses were omitted: Watterson, 33.

  100. “cooled my ardor for the game personally.”: Camp, 161, 164.

  100. “. . . nambypambyism, then play football.”: Ibid., 46.

  101. “. . . who has been seriously injured.”: Ibid., 209–10.

  101. fresh men into the game: Quotes from captains all from “Opinions of Captains,” Chicago Daily Tribune, November 11, 1897, 4.

  101. “. . . thirty thousand spectators.”: “Slugball Courage,” Chicago Daily Tribune, December 9, 1896, 6.

  101. “. . . crippled in the course of it.”: This is excerpted from a New York Tribune editorial, as quoted in “Slugball,” Chicago Daily Tribune, November 9, 1897, 6.

  102. hence, the term“yellow.”: James McGrath Morris, Pulitzer: A Life in Politics, Print, and Power (New York: Harper, 2010), 330–31.

  102. “. . . not fail to get a thrill of interest.”: Will Irwin, “The American Newspaper,” Collier’s, February 18, 1911, 16.

  102. “. . . widely discussed newspaper in New York.”: Ibid., 14.

  102. “. . . a temple of America’s new mass media.”: Morris, 287.

  102. “. . . even amplified Pulitzer’s approach.”: Irwin, 22.

  102. “. . . World and Journal became melodrama.”: Ibid.

  103. text of Georgia’s antifootball bill: Michael Oriard, Reading Football: How the Popular Press Created an American Spectacle (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1993), 205.

  103. “. . . in every football game.”: Illustration, New York. World, November 14, 1897, 1.

  103. “. . . campaigns for circulation.”: Oriard, 203.

  103. “. . . being exposed as mayhem.”: Ibid.

  103. “. . . savage instincts of onlookers.”: “Death on the Football Field,” New York Herald, November 13, 1897, 4.

  103. that was plaguing the sport: “Harvard or Yale the Cry To-Day,” New York Herald, November 13, 1897, 4.

  104. all of them in 1897 alone: Amos Alonzo Stagg Papers, University of Chicago Archives, various unlabeled newspaper clippings.

  Chapter 11

  105. “. . . black with people.”: “Chicago is Beaten,” Chicago Daily Tribune, November 14, 1897, 3.

  105. packed into the grandstand: “Madison, 23; Chicago, 8,” (Milwaukee) Sunday Sentinel, November 14, 1897, 1.

  105. nothing but dread: “Plotke Sees a Game,” Chicago Daily Tribune, November 14, 1897, 4.

  106. “. . . forehead in drops.”: All quotes in this paragraph from ibid.

  106. to the meeting: “Alderman Killed,” Chicago Daily Tribune, November 9, 1897, 1.

  106. election to the city council: “Nathan M. Plotke,” Illinois Stats-Zeitung, July 16, 1900, 5; http://flps.newberry.org/article/5418474_11_1584/.

  106. in the city’s theaters: “War on Theater Hats,” Chicago Daily Tribune, January 5, 1897, 1.

  106. “the hat ordinance man.”: “Plotke Sees a Game,” Chicago Daily Tribune, November 14, 1897, 4.

  106. between five and fifty dollars: “Seeks to Bar Football,” Chicago Daily Tribune, November 9, 1897, 1.

  106. “. . . colleges a few years ago.”: “Abolish Slugball Now,” Chicago Daily Tribune, December 6, 1896, 30.

  107. “. . . for this elevating purpose.”: “The Slugball Season,” Chicago Daily Tribune, September 26, 1897, 30.

  107. “. . . often fatal practice.”: “He Defends Slugball,” Chicago Daily Tribune, November 22, 1897, 9.

  107. “. . . been severely injured.”: “More Slugball Casualties,” Chicago Daily Tribune, November 12, 1897, 6.

  107. Sure Wisconsin and Chicago Lads Will Inflict Death, read another: “Plotke Sees a Game,” Chicago Daily Tribune, November 14, 1897, 4.

  108. “. . . of the wounded, I suppose.”: Ibid.

  108. “. . . Garibaldi and George Washington.”: Ibid.

  108. “. . . on his way to a carriage.”: Ibid.

  108. “. . . in football circles as at present.”: “Await the Kickoff,” Daily Cardinal, November 10, 1897, 2.

  108. “over the heads of the baffled collegiate.”: “O’Dea’s Day Again,” Milwaukee Sentinel, November 7, 1897, 26.

  109. eighteen-member university band: “Off for the Battle,” Daily Cardinal, November 12, 1897, 1.

  109. a severe stomach ache: Amos Alonzo Stagg and Wesley Winans Stout, Touchdown! (New Yo
rk: Longmans, Green and Co., 1927), 207.

  109. “of no use to us.”: “Stagg Tells Grid Story,” Baltimore Sun, November 6, 1957, S26.

  109. the Badgers struck: Wisconsin 23, Chicago 8—November 13, 1897. Game descriptions taken from the following sources: Roy L. Foley, “Champions of the West in ’97 —and Badgers Won Title for Gobbling Turkeys, Too,” Wisconsin News, 1934, unknown date; “Chicago Is Beaten,” Chicago Daily Tribune, November 14, 1897, 3; “Madison, 23; Chicago, 8,” (Milwaukee) Sunday Sentinel, November 14, 1897, 1; “25 to 8,” Daily Cardinal, November 13, 1897, 1; “Nothing to Nothing,” Sioux City Journal, November 14, 1897; “The ‘Kangaroo’ Kicker,” Middleville (Michigan) Sun, December 9, 1897.

  110. “. . . It had enough.”: “Chicago Is Beaten,” Chicago Daily Tribune, November 14, 1897, 3.

  110. “. . . they do the game.”: “Madison, 23; Chicago, 8,” (Milwaukee) Sunday Sentinel, November 14, 1897, 1.

  110. “. . . in the house.”: Ibid.

  111. “all the loose wood at Ladies’ hall.”: “Red Fire in Madison,” (Milwaukee) Sunday Sentinel, November 14, 1897.

  111. “one man’s toe settled the struggle.”: “Chicago Is Beaten,” Chicago Daily Tribune, November 14, 1897, 3.

  111. “. . . brilliant feature of the day.”: “Madison, 23; Chicago, 8,” (Milwaukee) Sunday Sentinel, November 14, 1897, 1.

  111. “. . . for such a move.”: “Will Refuse,” Milwaukee Journal, November 15, 1897, 1.

  112. defeated 57 to 5: “Plotke Fails at Tackle,” Chicago Daily Tribune, November 16, 1897, 1.

  112. loss of the season: “Varsity Defeated,” Daily Cardinal, November 22, 1897, 1.

  112. “. . . a bunch of quitters.”: Meir Z. Ribalow, “Phil King ’93, Little Big Man,” Princeton Alumni Weekly, September 26, 1977, 19.

  112. “. . . length and beauty.”: “Kicker O’Dea,” Milwaukee Journal, November 24, 1897.

  113. “. . . he gave it up.”: Ibid.

  113. “. . . at a bench show.”: Ibid.

  113. “. . . peculiar side movement.”: Ibid.

  113. cruised to a 22–0 win: “Badgers Head List,” Duluth News Tribune, November 26, 1897.

  113. turkey disappeared quickly: Roy L. Foley, “Champions of the West in ’97 —and Badgers Won Title for Gobbling Turkeys, Too,” Wisconsin News, 1934, unknown date.