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American Football Fan-atics
Do you know your football history?
If you are an American football fan-atic, this is your favoriate time of year... when college and pro football teams are all the buzz and on every form of media there is talk of rankings, ratings, play-offs, injuries, recruits, spirals, fumbles, Heisman candidates and so much more. Well, if you are going to be a true fan, you should know the fascinating history of our beloved American football game.
American football evolved out of both soccer and rugby. In the 11th century in England, young boys played a tackle game with an inflated cow bladder. This game grew to include the village men running the bladder "ball" into the middle of the opponents village, but it became so dangerous and deadly that the King put a halt to the game. Then In the 1960's the game resurfaced and a form of soccer was played on fields in England where players could only use their feet to touch the ball. Around the same time, the Irish teams played a similar game while hitting the ball with their fists. In 1923 at Rugby College, legend has it that William Ellis picked up the ball and rant id down the field for a gaol, breaking the rules but the crowd loved it. Thus the game of Rugby was began and the catalyst to today's football.
The American colonists played a similar type of football-game and by the mid 1800's colleges began to challenge each other to games of football. The first football game in 1869 was Rutgers and Princeton where the rules permitted kicking, hitting or dribbling the ball. Throwing or running the ball were prohibited. But then in 1874, Harvard matched up with a Canadian team, McGill University and played two games, one with running the ball and one without.
In 1875, in the first Harvard vs. Yale football game, players were allowed to carry the ball. Following this, in 1876 the first Intercollegiate football Association was created to establish rules of play. Walter Camp, a Yale player attended and later created the line of scrimmage and the quarterback posi tion. Camp became known as the Father of American Football.
Camp is shown in this photograph taken of the 1879 Yale football team, holding the football in the center of the photo.
Not long after the sport began to grow as a college competition, athletic associations got in the game and out of those clubs grew professional football. The first professional player known to be paid was William "Pudge" Heffelfinger. He was given $500 by the Allegheny Athletic Association to play against the Pittsburgh Athletic Club in 1892.
Today the sport has millions of fans and generates billions of dollars in revenue for colleges and local economies. Read more about the history of American Football here.
Coming next week- OSU vs. Michigan - the history behind the great rivalry.
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