Football Days Part 10

Hector Cowan, who was captain of the Princeton '88 team was another rough player. In those days the men in the heat of playing would indulge in exclamations hardly fit for a drawing room. In fact most of the time the words used would have been more in place among a lot of pirates.

Cowan was no exception to the rule so far as giving vent to his feelings was concerned, but he invariably used one phrase to do so. He was a fellow of sterling character and was studying for the ministry. Not even the excitement of the moment could make him forget himself to the extent of the other players, and where their language would have to be represented in print by a lot of dashes, Cowan's could be printed in the blackest face type without offending anyone.

It was amusing to see this big fellow, worked up to the point of explosion, wave his arms and exclaim:

"Oh, sugar!"

It would bring a roar of mock protest from the other players, and threats to report him for his rough talk. While the men made joke of Hector's talk they had a thorough respect for his sterling principles.

VICTORIOUS DAYS AT YALE

During the early days of football Yale's record was an enviable one. The schedules included, Yale, Harvard, Princeton, University of Pennsylvania, Rutgers, Columbia, Stevens Inst.i.tute of Technology, Dartmouth, Amherst, and University of Michigan.

It is interesting to note that since the formation of the Football a.s.sociation, in 1879 to 1889, Yale had been awarded the champions.h.i.+p flag five times, Princeton one, Harvard none. Yale had won 95 out of 98 games, having lost three to Princeton, one to Harvard and one to Columbia. Since 1878 Yale had lost but one game and that by one point.

This was the Tilly Lamar game, which Princeton won. In points Yale had scored, since points began to be counted, 3001 to her opponents' 56; in goals 530 to 19 and in touchdowns 219 to 9, which is truly a unique record.

It was during this period that Pa Corbin, a country boy, entered Yale and in his senior year became captain of the famous '88 team. This brilliant eleven had a wonderfully successful season and Yale men now began to take stock and really appreciate the remarkable record that was hers upon the field of football.

In commemoration of these victories, Yale men gathered from far and near, crowding Delmonico's banquet hall to the limit to pay tribute to Yale athletic successes.

"And it came to pa.s.s, when the people heard the sound of the trumpet, and the people shouted with a great shout ... they took the city."

In a room beautifully decorated with Yale banners and trophies four hundred Elis sat down to enjoy the Bulldog Feast, and there honored and cheered to the echo the great football traditions of Yale and the men who made her famous by so vast a margin.

Chauncey M. Depew in his address that evening stated that for the only time in one hundred and eighty-eight years the alumni of Yale met solely to celebrate her athletic triumphs.

Pa Corbin, captain of the victorious '88 football team, responded, as follows:

"Again we have met the enemy and he is ours. In fact we have been successful so many times there is something of a sameness about it. It is a good deal like what the old man said about leading a good life. It is monotonous, but satisfactory. There are perhaps a few special reasons why we won the champions.h.i.+p this year, but the general principles are the same, which have always made us win. First, by following out certain traditions, which are handed down to us year by year from former team captains and coaches; the necessity of advancing each year beyond the point attained the year before; the mastering of the play of our opponents and planning our game to meet it. Second, by the hard, conscientious work, such as only a Yale team knows how to do. Third, by going on to the field with that high courage and determination which has always been characteristic of the Yale eleven, something like the spirit of the ancient Greeks who went into battle with the decision to return with their s.h.i.+elds or on them. Sometimes they have been animated with the spirit which knows no defeat, like the little drummer boy, who was ordered by Napoleon in a crisis in the battle to beat a retreat. The boy did not move. 'Boy, beat a retreat.' He did not stir, but at a third command, he straightened up and said: 'Sire, I know not how, but I can beat a charge that will wake the dead.' He did so and the troops moved forward and were victorious. It is this same spirit which in many cases has seemed to animate our men.

[Ill.u.s.tration:

Rhodes Woodruff Heffelfinger Gill Wallace Stagg McClung Captain Corbin Bull Wurtenberg Graves

PA CORBIN'S TEAM]

"But our victory is due in a great measure this year to a man who knows more about football than any man in this country, who gave much of his valuable time in continually advising and in actual coaching on the field. I refer to Walter Camp, and as long as his spirit hovers over the Yale campus and our traditions for football playing are religiously followed out there is no reason why Yale should not remain, as she always has been, at the head of American football."

Those were Corbin's recollections the year of that great victory. Time has not dimmed them, nor has his memory faded. Rather the opposite.

From what follows you will note that a woman now enters the camp of the Eli coaching staff, mention of whom was not made in Corbin's speech of '88.

Pa Corbin prides himself in the fact that twenty-five years afterward he brought his old team mates together and gave them a dinner. The menu card tells of the traditional coaching system of Corbin's great team of '88 and beneath the picture of Mr. and Mrs. Walter Camp appears in headlines:

"HEAD COACHES OF THE YALE FOOTBALL TEAM OF 1888"

"The head-coaches of the Yale team," says Corbin, "were really Mr. and Mrs. Walter Camp. They had been married in the summer of 1888 and were staying with relatives in New Haven. Mr. Camp had just begun his connection with a New Haven concern which occupied most of his time.

Mrs. Camp was present at Yale Field every day at the football practice and made careful note of the plays, the players and anything that should be observed in connection with the style of play and the individual weakness or strength. She gave her observations in detail to her husband at supper every night and when I arrived Mr. Camp would be thoroughly familiar with that day's practice and would be ready for suggestions as to plays and players to be put in operation the next day.

"This method was pursued during the entire season and was practically the only systematic coaching that the team received. Of course there were several old players like Tompkins '84, Terry '85 and Knapp '82, who came to the field frequently.

"At that time it was customary for me to snap the ball back to the quarter with my foot. By standing the ball on end and exercising a certain pressure on the same it was possible to have it bound into the quarterback's hands. It was necessary, therefore, for me to attend to this detail as well as to block my opponent and make holes through the line for the backs.

"While the rules of the game at that time provided for an Umpire as well as a Referee, the fact that there was no neutral zone and players were in close contact with each other on the line of scrimmage gave opportunity for more roughness than is customary at the present time.

Neither were the officials so strict about their rulings.

"Prior to this time it had been customary to give word signals for the different plays, these being certain words which were used in various sentences relating to football and the progress of the game. As center, I was so tall that a system of sign signals was devised which I used entirely in the Princeton game, and the opponents, from the talk, which continued as usual, supposed that word signals were being used and were entirely ignorant of the sign signals during the progress of the game.

The pulling of the visor of my cap was a kick signal. Everything that I did with my left hand in touching different parts of my uniform on the left side from collar to shoe lace meant a signal for a play at different points on the left side of the line. Similar signals with my right hand meant similar plays on the right side of the line. The system worked perfectly and there was no case of missed signal. The next year the use of numbers for signals began, and has continued until the present date.

"The work of the Yale team during the season was very much r.e.t.a.r.ded by injuries to their best players. The papers were so filled with these accounts that the general opinion of the public was that the team would be in poor physical condition to meet Princeton. As luck would have it, however, the invalids reached a convalescing stage in time to enter the Wesleyan game on the Sat.u.r.day before the one to be played with Princeton in fairly good condition.

"Head Coach Camp and I attended the Princeton-Harvard game at Princeton on that day. Upon our return to New York we received a telegram from Mrs. Camp to the effect that the score made by Yale against Wesleyan was 105 to nothing. One of the graduate coaches was much impressed with the opportunity to turn a few pennies and he requested that the information be kept quiet until he could see a few Princeton men. The result was that he negotiated the small end of several stakes at long odds against Yale. When the news of the Wesleyan score was made public the next morning, the opinion of the public changed somewhat as to the merit of the team. It nevertheless went into the Princeton game as not being the favorite and in the opinion of disinterested persons it was expected that Princeton would win handsomely."

Cowan the great has this to say:

"I happened to be down on the grounds to watch the practice just a few days before the Yale game. They did not have enough scrub to make a good defense. Jim Robinson happened to see me there and asked me to play. He had asked me before, and I had always refused, but this time for some reason I accepted and he took me to the Club house.

"I got into my clothes. The shoes were about three sizes too small. That day I played guard opposite Tracy Harris. I played well enough so that they wanted me to come down the next day, as they said they wanted good practice. The next day I was put against Captain Bird, who had been out of town the first day I played. He had the reputation of being not at all delicate in the way he handled the scrub men who played against him, so that they had learned to keep away from him.

"As I had not played before, I did not know enough to be afraid of him, so when the ball was put in play I simply charged forward at the quarterback and was able to spoil a good many of his plays. I heard afterward that Bird asked Jim Robinson who that d.a.m.n freshman was that played against him. The next year I was put in Bird's place at left guard, as he had graduated and fought all comers for the place. I was never put on the scrub again.

"My condition when in Princeton was the best. Having been raised in the country, I knew what hard work was and in the five years that I played football I never left the field on account of injury either in practice or in games with other teams.

"It is a great thing to play the game of football as hard as you can. I never deliberately went to do a man up. If he played a rough game, I simply played him the harder. I never struck a man with my fist in the game. I do not remember ever losing my temper. Perhaps I did not have temper enough.

"When we speak of a football man's nerve I would say that any man who stopped to think of himself is not worthy of the game, but there is one man who seemed to me had a little more nerve than the average. I think that he played for two years on our scrub, and the reason that he was kept there so long was on account of his size. He only weighed about 138 pounds, but for all the time he played on the scrub he played halfback and no one ever saw him hesitate to make every inch that he could, even though he knew he had to suffer for it.

"In the fall of '88, I think, Yup Cook played right tackle on the Varsity. He was very strong in his shoulders and arms and had the grip of a blacksmith. Channing, this nervy little 138-pounder, played left halfback on the scrub. When he went into the line, Cook would take him by the shoulders and slam him into the ground. Our playing field at the time was very dry and the ground was like a rock. I used to feel very sorry for the little fellow. On his elbows and hips and knees he had raw sores as big as silver dollars; yet he never hesitated to make the attempt, and he never called 'down' to save himself from punishment. The next year he made the team. Everybody admired him.

"Football men must never forget Tilly Lamar, who played halfback. I think he was one of the greatest halfbacks and one who would have made a record in any age of football. I have seen him go through a line with nearly every man on the opposing team holding him. He would break loose from one after the other.

"Lamar was a short, chunky fellow and ran close to the ground with his back level, and about the only place one could get hold of him was his shoulders. He would always turn toward the tackler instead of away, and it had the effect of throwing him over his head. The only way that the Yale men could stop him at all was to dive clear under and get him by the legs.

"You have always heard a lot about Snake Ames. Snake was a very spectacular player, but one very hard to stop, especially in an open field. He was very fast and during the last year of his playing he developed a duck and would go clear under the man trying to tackle him.

This he did by putting one hand flat on the ground, so that his body would just miss the ground; even the good tacklers that Yale always had were not able to stop him.

"One of Princeton's old reliables was our center, George, '89. He may not have got much out of the plaudits from the grandstand, but those of us who knew what he was doing appreciated his work. We always felt safe as to our center. He was steady and brilliant.

"It was during this time that Yale developed a wedge play on center.

There were no restrictions as to how the line would be formed, and Yale would put all their guards and tackles and ends back, forming a big V with the man with the ball in the center.

"Yale had been able to knock the opposing center out of the way till they struck George. How well I remember this giant, who was able to hold the whole wedge until he could knock the sides in and pile them up in a bunch. Yale soon gave him up and tried to gain elsewhere.

"I must tell you about one more of Princeton's football players. Not so much for his playing, but for his head work. During the years that I was captain, in the fall of '88 the rules were changed so that one was allowed to block an opponent only by the body. In other words, not allowed to use hands or arms in blocking. It was Sam Hodge, who played end and worked out what is known to-day as boxing the tackle. You can understand what effect it would have on a man who was not used to it.

The end would knock the opposing tackle and send him clear out of the play and the half would keep the end out."

I once asked Cowan to tell something about his experiences and men he played against.

"The Yale game was the great game in my days," he said. "Harvard did not have the football instinct as well developed as Yale, and it is of the Yale players that I have more in mind. One man I will always remember is Gill, who played left tackle for Yale and was captain during his senior year. I remember him because we had a good deal to do with each other.