Football Days Part 39

"This I know because no month pa.s.ses, indeed it is almost safe to say, hardly a week, year in and year out, in which they are not insistently resurgent.

"Marshall Newell was born in Clifton, N. J., on April 2, 1871. His early life was spent largely on his father's farm in Great Barrington, Ma.s.s., that farm and countryside which seemed to mean so much to him in later years. He entered Phillips Exeter Academy in the fall of 1887, and was graduated in 1890. Almost at once he achieved, utterly without effort, a popularity rare in its quality. Because of his relation with his schoolmates and his unostentatious way of looking after the welfare of others, he soon came to be known as Ma Newell, and this affectionate sobriquet not only clung to him through all the years at Exeter and Harvard, but followed him after graduation whithersoever he went. While at school he took up athletics ardently as he always took up everything.

Thus he came up to Harvard with an athletic reputation ready made.

"It was not long before the cla.s.s of '94 began to feel that subtler influence of character that distinguished all his days. He was a member of the victorious football eleven of 1890, and of the winning crew of 1891, both in his freshman year. He also played on the freshman football team and on the university team of '91, '92, '93, and rowed on the Varsity crews of '92 and '93. In the meantime he was gaining not only the respect and friends.h.i.+p of his cla.s.smates, but those of the instructors as well. Socially, and despite the fact that he was little endowed with this world's goods, he enjoyed a remarkable popularity. He was a member of the Inst.i.tute of 1770, d.i.c.key, Hasty Pudding, and Signet. In addition, he was the unanimous choice of his cla.s.s for Second Marshal on Cla.s.s Day. Many other honors he might have had if he had cared to seek them. He accepted only those that were literally forced upon him.

"In the course of his college career he returned each summer to his home in Great Barrington and quietly resumed his work on the farm.

"After graduation he was a remarkably successful football coach at Cornell University, and was also a vast help in preparing Harvard elevens. His annual appearance in the fall at Cambridge was always the means of putting fresh heart and confidence in the Crimson players.

"He turned to railroading in the fall of 1896, acting as a.s.sistant Superintendent of the Springfield Division of the Boston and Albany Railroad. Here, as at college, he made a profound personal impression on his a.s.sociates. The end came on the evening of December 24th, in 1897.

"In a memorial from his cla.s.smates and friends, the following significant paragraph appears: 'Marshall Newell belonged to the whole University. He cannot be claimed by any clique or cla.s.s. Let us, his cla.s.smates, simply express our grat.i.tude that we have had the privilege of knowing him and of observing his simple, grand life. We rejoice in memories of his comrades.h.i.+p; we deeply mourn our loss. To those whose affliction has been even greater than our own, we extend our sympathy.'

This memorial was signed by Bertram Gordon Waters, Lincoln Davis, and George C. Lee, Jr., for the cla.s.s, men who knew him well.

"Harvard men, I feel sure, will forgive me if I like to believe that Newell belonged not merely to the whole Harvard University, but to every group of men that came under his influence, whether the football squad at Cornell or the humble track walkers of the Boston and Albany.

"Remains, I think, little more for me to say, and this can best be said in Newell's own words, selections from that diary of which I have already spoken, and which set the stamp on the character of the man for all time. This, for instance:

"'It is amusing to notice the expression in the faces of the horses on the street as you walk along; how much they resemble people, not in feature, but in spirit. Some are cross and snap at the men who pa.s.s; others asleep; and some will almost thank you for speaking to them or patting their noses.' And this, in more serious vein: 'Happened to think how there was a resemblance in water and our spirits, or rather in their sources. Some people are like springs, always bubbling over with freshness and life; others are wells and have to be pumped; while some are only reservoirs whose spirits are pumped in and there stagnate unless drawn off immediately. Most people are like the wells, but the pump handle is not always visible or may be broken off. Many of the springs are known only to their shady nooks and velvet marshes, but, once found, the path is soon worn to them, which constantly widens and deepens. It may be used only by animals, but it is a blessing and comfort if only to the flowers and gra.s.ses that grow on its edge.'

"Serious as the man was, there are glints and gleams of quiet humor throughout this remarkable human doc.u.ment. One night in May he wrote, 'Stars and moon are bright this evening; frogs are singing in the meadow, and the fire-flies are twinkling over the gra.s.s by the spring.

Tree toads have been singing to-day. Set two hens to-night, nailed them in. If you want to see determination, look in a setting hen's eye.

Robins have been carrying food to their nests in the pine trees, and the barn swallows fighting for feathers in the air; the big barn is filled with their conversation.'

"In the city he missed, as he wrote, 'the light upon the hills.' Again, 'The stars are the eyes of the sky. The sun sets like a G.o.d bowing his head. Pine needles catch the light that has streamed through them for a hundred years. The wind drives the clouds one day as if they were waves of crested brown.' Where indeed in the crowded city streets was he to listen 'to the language of the leaves,' and how indeed, 'Feel the colors of the West.'

"Is it not possible that something more even than the example and influence of his character was lost to the world in his death? What possibilities were there not in store for a man who could feel and write like this: 'Grand thunderstorm this evening. Vibrations shook the house and the flashes of lightning were continuous for a short time. It is authority and majesty personified, and one instinctively bows in its presence, not with a feeling of dread, but of admiration and respect.'

"It was in the thunder and shock and blaze of just such a storm that I stood not long ago among his own Berks.h.i.+re Hills, hoping thus to prepare myself by pilgrimage for this halting but earnest tribute to a great-hearted gentleman, who, in his quiet way, meant so much to so many of his fellow humans."

Walter B. Street

W. L. Sawtelle of Williams, who knew this great player in his playing days, writes as follows:

"No Williams contemporary of Walter Bullard Street can forget two outstanding facts of his college career: his immaculate personal character and his undisputed t.i.tle to first rank among the football men whom Williams has developed. He was idolized because of his athletic prowess; he was loved because he was every inch a man. His personality lifted his game from the level of an intercollegiate contest to the plane of a man's expression of loyalty to his college, and his supremacy on the football field gave a new dignity to the undergraduate's ideals of true manhood.

"His name is indelibly written in the athletic annals of Williams, and his influence, apparently cut off by his early death, is still a vital force among those who cheered his memorable gains on the gridiron and who admired him for his virile character."

W. D. Osgood

Gone from among us is that great old-time hero, Win Osgood. In this chapter of thoroughbreds, let us read the tribute George Woodruff pays him:

"When my thoughts turn to the scores of fine, manly football players I have known intimately, Win Osgood claims, if not first place, at least a unique place, among my memories. As a player he has never been surpa.s.sed in his specialty of making long and brilliant runs, not only around, but through the ranks of his opponents. After one of his seventy- or eighty-yard runs his path was always marked by a zig-zag line of opposing tacklers just collecting their wits and slowly starting to get up from the ground. None of them was ever hurt, but they seemed temporarily stunned as though, when they struck Osgood's mighty legs, they received an electric shock.

"While at Cornell in 1892, Osgood made, by his own prowess, two to three touchdowns against each of the strong Yale, Harvard and Princeton elevens, and in the Harvard-Pennsylvania game at Philadelphia in 1894, he thrilled the spectators with his runs more than I have ever seen any man do in any other one game.

"But I would belittle my own sense of Osgood's real worth if I confined myself to expatiating on his brilliant physical achievements. His moral worth and gentle bravery were to me the chief points in him that arouse true admiration. When I, as coach of Penn's football team, discovered that Osgood had quietly matriculated at Pennsylvania, without letting anybody know of his intention, I naturally cultivated his friends.h.i.+p, in order to get from him his value as a player; but I found he was of even more value as a moral force among the players and students. In this way he helped me as much as by his play, because, to my mind, a football team is good or bad according to whether the bad elements or the good, both of which are in every set of men, predominate.

"In the winter of 1896, Osgood nearly persuaded me to go with him on his expedition to help the Cubans, and I have often regretted not having been with him through that experience. He went as a Major of Artillery to be sure, but not for the t.i.tle, nor the adventure only, but I am sure from love of freedom and overwhelming sympathy for the oppressed. He said to me:

"'The Cubans may not be very lovely, but they are human, and their cause is lovely.'

"When Osgood, with almost foolhardy bravery, sat his horse directing his dilapidated artillery fire in Cuba, and thus conspicuous, made himself even more marked by wearing a white sombrero, he was not playing the part of a fool; he was following his natural impulse to exert a moral force on his comrades who could understand little but liberty and bravery.

"When the Angel of Death gave him the accolade of n.o.bility by touching his brow in the form of a Mauser bullet, Win Osgood simply welcomed his friend by gently breathing 'Well,' a word typical of the man, and even in death, it is reported, continued to sit erect upon his horse."

Gordon Brown

There are many young men who lost a true friend when Gordon Brown died.

He was their ideal. After his college days were over, he became very much interested in settlement work on the East Side in New York. He devoted much of his time after business to this great work which still stands as a monument to him. He was as loyal to it as he was to football when he played at Yale. Gordon Brown's career at Yale was a remarkable one. He was captain of the greatest football team Yale ever had.

Whenever the 1900 team is mentioned it is spoken of as Gordon Brown's team. The spirit of this great thoroughbred still lives at Yale, still lives at Groton School where he spent six years. He was captain there and leader in all the activities in the school. He was one of the highest type college men I have ever known. He typified all the best there was in Yale. He was strong mentally, as well as physically.

It was my pleasure to have played against him in two Yale-Princeton games, '98 and '99. I have never known a finer sportsman than he. He played the game hard, and he played it fair. He had nothing to say to his opponents in the game. He was there for business. Always urging his fellow players on to better work. Every one who knew this gallant leader had absolute confidence in him. All admired and loved him. There was no one at Yale who was more universally liked and acknowledged as a leader in all the relations of the University than was Gordon Brown. The influence of such a man cannot but live as a guide and inspiration for all that is best at Yale University.

Gordon Brown's name will live in song and story. There were with him Yale men not less efficient in the football sense, as witnesses the following:

A Yale Song verse from the _Yale Daily News_, November 16th, 1900:

Jimmy Wear and Gordon Brown, Fincke and Stillman gaining ground; Olcott in the center stands With Perry Hale as a battering ram-- No hope for Princeton;

James J. Hogan

The boys who were at Exeter when that big raw-boned fellow, Jim Hogan, entered there will tell of the n.o.ble fight he made to get an education.

He worked with his hands early and late to make enough money to pay his way. His effort was a splendid one. He was never idle, and was an honor man for the greater part of his stay at school. He found time to go out for football, however, and turned out to be one of the greatest players that ever went to Exeter. Jim Hogan was one of the highest type of Exeter men, held up as an example of what an Exeter boy should be. His spirit still lives in the school. In speaking of Hogan recently, Professor Ford of Exeter, said:

"Whenever Hogan played football his hands were always moving in the football line. It was almost like that in the cla.s.sroom, always on the edge of his seat fighting for every bit of information that he could get and determined to master any particularly difficult subject. It was interesting and almost amusing at times to watch him. One could not help respecting such earnestness. He possessed great powers of leaders.h.i.+p and there was never any question as to his sincerity and perfect earnestness. He was not selfish, but always trying to help his fellow students accomplish something. His influence among the boys was thoroughly good, and he held positions of honor and trust from the time of his admission."

Jim was hungry for an education--eager to forge ahead. His whole college career was an earnest endeavor. He never knew what it was to lose heart. "Letting go" had no part in his life.

Jim was a physical marvel. His 206 pounds of bone and muscle counted for much in the Yale rush line. Members of the faculty considered him the highest type of Yale man, and it is said that President Hadley of Yale once referred to 1905 as "Hogan's Cla.s.s."

As a football player, Jim had few equals. He was captain of the Yale team in his senior year and was picked by the experts as an "All-American Tackle."

Jim Hogan at his place in the Yale rush line was a sight worth seeing.

With his jersey sleeves rolled up above his elbows and a smile on his face, he would break into the opposing line, smash up the interference and throw the backs for a loss.

I can see him rus.h.i.+ng the ball, scoring touchdowns, making holes in the line, doing everything that a great player could do, and urging on his team mates:

"Harder, Yale; hard, harder, Yale."

He was a hard, strong, cheerful player; that is, he was cheerful as long as the other men fought fair.

Great was Jim Hogan. To work with him shoulder to shoulder was my privilege. To know him, was to love, honor and respect him.