Football

This stone Commemorates the exploit of

William Webb Ellis Who with a fine disregard for the rules of

football as played in his time

First took the ball in his arms and ran with it

Thus originating the distinctive feature of

The Rugby Game

A.D. 1823

So reads a tablet on the vine-covered wall of Rugby School close, England. It was not until 1869 that the first intercollegiate football game in the world was played at New Brunswick, N. J. between Princeton and Rutgers. Last week Rutgers, taking part in the celebration of New Brunswick's 250th birthday, re-enacted that game. Chief Justice William Stryker Gummere of the New Jersey Supreme Court, captain of the Princeton team of 1869, is still alive, but his part in the pageant was taken by an understudy. Like the footballers of the old days, several of the pageant players wore whiskers. They kicked the ball as though they were playing soccer. There were 25 on a side--two placed permanently before the enemy's goal, eleven in various stations around the field and designated as "fielders," twelve who roved with the ball and were called "bulldogs." As in the great original game, Rutgers won, 6-4, by a smart stratagem. Finding the tall Princetonians could beat them when the ball flew high by batting it over Rutgers heads with their hands, the Rutgers team kept it on the ground and scuttled through to victory.*

The Army line seemed inadequate when Harvard got its off-tackle plays and line plunges working in the two middle periods, energized by a backfield giant named Jack Crickard. But in the first period Eddie Herb, son of a non-commissioned officer in the regular Army, spun through on a fake reverse that was the only score of the game. Army 6, Harvard o.

Held almost motionless in the first period, Notre Dame opened its box of tricks against a strong Carnegie team. Wonderful passing turned what had been advertised as a "one-point" game into a runaway. Notre Dame 21, Carnegie 6.

Princeton tried almost as many passes as running plays, but Cornell put five men back in the secondary defense to interrupt the airline. Viviano and Handleman each scored and Princeton failed to get the break they tried for so wildly in the last period. Cornell 12, Princeton 7.

Midget Albie Booth silenced critics who claimed Yale was saving him for the Army, Harvard and Princeton games. He eeled through for one touchdown and dropkicked a 25-yd. field goal while he and his friends were beating the Brown huskies who had beaten Princeton the week before. Yale 21, Brown o.

Tennessee, unbeaten for three seasons, was line-bucked off the Dixie highway by Alabama's Crimson stompers, 18 to 6.

Stanford's substitutes had to work hard to keep the one-touchdown lead that Pop

Warner's regulars gained in the second period. Stanford 13, Oregon State 7.

Scheduled as an easy workout between the Notre Dame and Princeton games, fast little Duke worked a hidden ball trick that baffled the butterfingered Navy, 18 to o.

In spite of wholesale vaccinations against smallpox and the loss of three stars, Northwestern's Hanley, Rentner and Baker dashed through the holes made for them by a great line to put a pox on Illinois, 32 to o.

Quarterback Newman of Michigan saw Captain Simrall far down the field and threw the ball to him. The second touchdown was unnecessary. Michigan 13, Ohio State o.

*Philip Milledoler Brett, Manhattan lawyer, captain of a late team, credited with the famed statement, "I'd die for dear old Rutgers." He denied it. Others too have denied it, but asserted they knew who did say it.

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