University of Virginia Library

XXX. Athletics—Football

"One afternoon in November, 1870," we are informed
by the editors of the revived magazine, "the junior mathematical
class, on going to their lecture-room, found that
there would be no lecture, and returned swearing across
the Lawn. Soon a rough-and-tumble game of football,
gotten up then and there, began. Since then, the game
has become very popular with the students, and is played
every evening on the ground between the orchard and the
laboratory." At this time, there was apparently no step
taken to organize this sport scientifically, but nevertheless
it seems to have been pursued with a remarkable display
of ardor. "I was strolling down to the postoffice," says
the philosopher of the magazine, in 1872, "when I saw a
crowd of coatless youth engaged in what seemed to us the
insane sport of rushing together, and trying to kick each
others' hats off. Ever desirous of gaining information,
we asked of a friend near us what was the matter. He
replied, 'Football,' and we, without any other information,
dashed off burning to enter into the glorious sport.
We entered. A friend kindly offered to take us on his
side. We thanked him and took our position, and were
kicked on the shins and on the knees."

It was asserted, in 1873, that not less than two hundred
students participated in the free and easy, go-as-you-please
games that were played during that year. It was intimated,
—probably in the spirit of irony,—that the members
of the medical class had exhibited peculiar aptitude
for these games, from the quickness with which they were
able, through the knowledge acquired in the class-room,
to bind up their broken skins and apply curative salves to
their ugly bruises. By the year 1874, a team had been
organized; and it began its sporting history by playing a

series of games with a club that had been formed by the
large English colony now settled in Albemarle county.
And not satisfied with this initial venture, it sent off a challenge
to the football team of Washington and Lee University.
The ground on which these games, as a rule,
took place was situated in the immediate neighborhood
of the new house occupied by Professor Mallet; but the
lot on which now stands the Brooks Museum was also
used. So keen was the interest which was felt at this
time even in the preliminary practice, that it was said
that the members of the club [23] were not to be deterred
by rain, or snow, or wind, from hastening to the field so
soon as they were at leisure. The style of their playing
was of a very inexact and loose character, although
the magazine had printed, for the benefit of the club, the
rules which had been adopted by the principal football
association of the country, which was composed of Yale,
Rutgers, and Princeton students. "About half past four
in the afternoon," we learn from Dr. Culbreth, "a few
young men with the ball would gather. They would divide
into sides and begin to kick. A signal would be
given for those near to rush in and form, while other recruits
were captured from the passersby, until a couple
of hundred were engaged in the field. There were goals,
and there were captains, but few, if any, regulations."

It could not be properly expected that this unmethodical
style of practicing would develop a team so skilful as
to be capable of successfully competing in an intercollegiate
test of superiority. As late as the autumn of
1881 there was no really scientific football organization
in existence at the University. The team selected for
that season seems to have been chosen by a committee.

But it was an encouraging sign that the interest of the
students in the sport was now steadily growing. In the
autumn of 1883, a club comprising a large membership
was formed, and every afternoon before the winter set in,
there were many furious struggles in the field. At the
end of a few years, the players,—who had, in the meanwhile,
been contending with obscure local opponents,—
thought themselves sufficiently trained to meet the team
of Johns Hopkins University, but this impression proved
to be misleading, for, in 1888, the score between the two
antagonists was twenty-six to zero in favor of the Maryland
institution. The University players were constrained
to satisfy their chastened ambition with the defeat
of the team of the Episcopal High School. The
University club had been regularly organized during the
previous session; but that no rigid standards of selection
were employed is demonstrated by the report of the following
conversation which has survived. The committee,
we are told, interviewed Robert Massie. "You are
chosen a member of the team," they laconically informed
him. "But I never played in my life," he protested in
his astonishment, "and know nothing about it." "Nor
do we," they replied. But whether Massie at that time
was too modest or not in his low estimate of his knowledge
of the game, he was afterwards elected to the responsible
post of captain.

The football club, like the baseball club, did not become
independent of precarious contributions by the students
until the shrewd suggestion of Felix H. Levy, a member
of the department of law, that the grounds should be enclosed
and an entrance fee demanded, was adopted. Of
the eleven regular players taking part in the games during
the session of 1889–90, not less than five had been recipients
of professional degrees. It was asserted, without

contradiction, that "the best members of the team had
been among the best students of the University." During
this session, one of the departments of the University,
the department of engineering, organized a football club,
membership in which was rigidly confined to its own
classes. But a sectional club like this had too small a fold
to draw on to possess a high order of skill. The University
team, on the other hand, had reached such a pitch
of efficiency by the autumn of 1889 that it was able to vanquish
the team of Johns Hopkins University by a score of
seventy-eight to zero. The challenges now sent out indicated
the aggressive confidence which its members now
felt in their own competency. During the months of October
and November, 1889, in addition to the game
with Johns Hopkins, they competed with the champions
of the Naval Academy, Lehigh University, Georgetown
College, and Wake Forest College. Of the six games,
the University team was successful in four. In 1890,
that team played six games with the picked men of Pennsylvania,
Princeton, and Washington and Lee Universities,
and Lafayette, Trinity, and Randolph-Macon College.
The University team succumbed to the team of
Princeton by a score of zero to one hundred and fifteen,
and to the team of the University of Pennsylvania by a
score of zero to sixty-two; but, in 1891, they sharply retaliated
by defeating the team of Princeton by a very
large margin. There were five games played in the
course of this year. In addition to the victory over
Princeton University, the University team defeated the
champions of St. John's College, and tied with those of
Lafayette and Schuylkill. There were played, in 1892,
six games, in four of which the University of Virginia was
successful. The team, during this year, was beaten by
the team of the University of Pennsylvania, and also by
the team of the University of North Carolina; but was
triumphant in a contest with the respective teams of
Georgetown College, Trinity College, and the University
of the South.

The autumn of 1892 will always be a memorable one
in the history of football at the University of Virginia.
It was then decided that every candidate for membership
in the team should be required to pursue a strict course of
training in the gymnasium. The practice in the field began
on the 15th of September, and, during an interval of
three weeks, the energies of the players were confined to
the acquisition of the rudiments of the game. Johnson
Poe, a former halfback of Princeton, was the coach.
How many high qualities were fostered by this drastic
system of instruction were eloquently recounted in an extract
which College Topics printed, with approving comments,
in its pages. "Football means brains as well as
brawn. It tells of temperate lives, well nourished bodies,
and well controlled nerves. It calls for coolness as well
as courage, for alert attention, quick wit, readiness of resource,
and all manliness of soul." Although the University
of Virginia was overwhelmed in its first game
with the University of Pennsylvania by a score of thirty-two
to zero, yet its team soon demonstrated the effect of
the remarkable training which they had received from
Johnson Poe.[24] During the autumn of 1893, there were
eleven games played with foreign competitors. The
score stood two hundred and forty-four to seventy-eight

in favor of the University team. During the spring of
1894, the score was four hundred and fourteen to
thirty in their favor. One of the most distinguished
members of this efficient team at this time was Addison
Greenway, whose skill in the field was said to have been
phenomenal.

By the session of 1894, the game of football had risen
to undisputed predominance among the athletic sports of
the University of Virginia, in consequence of the successes
of the team abroad. The following is the record
for this year of the scores made by the teams of the principal
seats of learning: Yale, sixteen games, points 485;
University of Pennsylvania, seventeen games, points 400;
Harvard University, thirteen games, points 334; Princeton
University, ten games, points 202; the University of
Virginia, ten games, points 414. The average for the
University of Virginia was 38.40; for Yale University,
29.50; for the University of Pennsylvania, 22.35; for
Harvard University, 22.15; and for Princeton University,
15.80. It was altogether justifiable, in the light of these
comparative figures, that the editors of the magazine
should have remarked in its pages with unconcealed satisfaction,
"Our career in football this year is very glorious.
The University of Virginia is beginning to take a high
place in college athletics."