Who is credited with inventing football?
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Krangodnzr
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Originally posted by Ryanwb
is there anyone person who thought this game up?
Also, who revolutionized the forward pass?
I know that the forward pass is sometimes attributed to Teddy Roosevelt....I know for a fact that he worked hard to change the game since it was too violent in it's early days.
He was President at the time and he tried to get people to change the game. Helmets were introduced and the forward pass was created.
Houdini
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SECTION 1
I'm not sure, but I don't think any one person was ever credited for it like Doubleday in baseball. And there is still some question about Doubleday. I think the game of football itself somehow just evolved out of Rugby and Soccer players from what I read in the past. They probably realized how boring those games were while drinking beer one day
Q: Who "invented" football?
A: College students.
In 1827 the sophomores of Harvard University challenged the freshmen class to a game of "ball," to be played on the first Monday of the new academic year.
That first games was a pretty informal affair; they just kicked around an inflated pig's bladder - a pigskin. There were few rules and there was no limit to how many people could play on each team so the entire freshman class played the entire sophomore class, minus anyone who chickened out. The young gentlemen - many of whom were very drunk - must have had a good time, because the freshman-sophomore ball game became an annual Harvard tradition.
...A very violent Harvard tradition: "The game consisted of kicking, pushing, slugging, and getting angry," Allison Danzig writes in The History of American Football. "Anyone who felt like joining in and getting his shins barked, his eyes blacked or his teeth knocked out, was free to do so." The sophomores had an advantage, because as returning students they could recognize their teammates on the field; the incoming freshmen could not.
Some years the game erupted into a full-blown riot, and even when it didn't it was still pretty rough; game day became known as "Bloody Monday." The 1860 Bloody Monday game was so bloody, in fact, that the university banned football altogether.
Sidenote: Games involving teams of people kicking and throwing a ball toward opposing goals have probably been around for as long as there have been things to kick; no one knows for sure when the first football-type game was played or who played in it. In China for example, people were kicking around balls stuffed with human hair as far back as 300 B.C.
A: College students.
In 1827 the sophomores of Harvard University challenged the freshmen class to a game of "ball," to be played on the first Monday of the new academic year.
That first games was a pretty informal affair; they just kicked around an inflated pig's bladder - a pigskin. There were few rules and there was no limit to how many people could play on each team so the entire freshman class played the entire sophomore class, minus anyone who chickened out. The young gentlemen - many of whom were very drunk - must have had a good time, because the freshman-sophomore ball game became an annual Harvard tradition.
...A very violent Harvard tradition: "The game consisted of kicking, pushing, slugging, and getting angry," Allison Danzig writes in The History of American Football. "Anyone who felt like joining in and getting his shins barked, his eyes blacked or his teeth knocked out, was free to do so." The sophomores had an advantage, because as returning students they could recognize their teammates on the field; the incoming freshmen could not.
Some years the game erupted into a full-blown riot, and even when it didn't it was still pretty rough; game day became known as "Bloody Monday." The 1860 Bloody Monday game was so bloody, in fact, that the university banned football altogether.
Sidenote: Games involving teams of people kicking and throwing a ball toward opposing goals have probably been around for as long as there have been things to kick; no one knows for sure when the first football-type game was played or who played in it. In China for example, people were kicking around balls stuffed with human hair as far back as 300 B.C.
Q: Who revolutionized the forward pass?
A: John Heisman.
In 1906 the Intercolegiate Athletic Association legalized the forward pass, largely on the suggestion of Georgia Institute of Technology coach John Heisman.
Heisman had witnessed the first forward pass while watching the North Carolina Tar Heels play against the Georgia Tech Bulldogs in 1895. The score was tied 0-0, late in the game, and the Tar Heels were losing ground. On the next down, the Carolina fullback ran behind his scrimmage line hoping to find a place to punt. No luck - there was no room to punt, so he just hurled the ball downfield in desperation; one of his teammates happened to catch it and ran 70 yards for a touchdown, winning the game.
The move was illegal, and the Bulldogs' legendary coach Pop Warner demanded that thetouchdown be tossed out. But the referee let football's first touchdown pass stand - because he hadn't actually seen it.
As concerns over increasing football violence mounted in the decade that followed, Heisman saw the forward pass as a means of cleaning up the game. He figured that if players could throw he ball over and past the mass formations, defending players would have to spread themselves out across the football field, and mass plays would become obsolete.
A: John Heisman.
In 1906 the Intercolegiate Athletic Association legalized the forward pass, largely on the suggestion of Georgia Institute of Technology coach John Heisman.
Heisman had witnessed the first forward pass while watching the North Carolina Tar Heels play against the Georgia Tech Bulldogs in 1895. The score was tied 0-0, late in the game, and the Tar Heels were losing ground. On the next down, the Carolina fullback ran behind his scrimmage line hoping to find a place to punt. No luck - there was no room to punt, so he just hurled the ball downfield in desperation; one of his teammates happened to catch it and ran 70 yards for a touchdown, winning the game.
The move was illegal, and the Bulldogs' legendary coach Pop Warner demanded that thetouchdown be tossed out. But the referee let football's first touchdown pass stand - because he hadn't actually seen it.
As concerns over increasing football violence mounted in the decade that followed, Heisman saw the forward pass as a means of cleaning up the game. He figured that if players could throw he ball over and past the mass formations, defending players would have to spread themselves out across the football field, and mass plays would become obsolete.
Cardinals.Ken
That's Mr. Riff-Raff to you!
I memory serves, the forward pass is not illegal in Rugby...just improper...
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Hard to believe that Harvard and the Ivy league was once a football power. Army too.
Houdini
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Found this doing a quick search. It sounds like no one knows for sure:
I suppose most football fans know that football originated back in the 1870s. In 1869, Princeton played Rutgers in a game that claims to be the origin — but what they played was really soccer. Harvard claims it started football, but what they were playing at about the same time was really English rugby. They and a few other colleges struggled to straighten out this confusing situation.
Walter Camp of Yale personally devised and imposed the game we now call football. Once, when Knute Rockne was asked where his famous Notre Dame “shift” came from, he replied, “Where everything else in football came from Yale.”
I am not a Yale man, but the Yale football tradition is — to use an undergraduate word “awesome.”
I suppose most football fans know that football originated back in the 1870s. In 1869, Princeton played Rutgers in a game that claims to be the origin — but what they played was really soccer. Harvard claims it started football, but what they were playing at about the same time was really English rugby. They and a few other colleges struggled to straighten out this confusing situation.
Walter Camp of Yale personally devised and imposed the game we now call football. Once, when Knute Rockne was asked where his famous Notre Dame “shift” came from, he replied, “Where everything else in football came from Yale.”
I am not a Yale man, but the Yale football tradition is — to use an undergraduate word “awesome.”
JeffGollin
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Who is credited with inventing football?
Murray Foote.
Murray Foote.
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McGill U. Montreal, Quebec Canada and the origins of American football
Having allegedly evolved during the Danish occupation of England where belligerent Anglo-Saxons kicked Viking skulls from village to village, football, of a slightly less bellicose sort, was imported to the New World by 17th and 18th century colonists.
In 1840, a reporter wrote of a Yale University game:
If the truth were told, the game would make the same impression on the public mind as a bullfight. Boys and young men knocked each other down and tore off each other’s clothing. Eyes were bunged, faces blackened, much blood was spilt and shirts and coats were torn to rags.
By 1860, the game was abolished in many American schools, but in 1862, Gerrit Smith Hiller organized a group at Yale to play again, using rules that were a reasonable close imitation of soccer. Still, the game was often more an excuse to beat up freshmen than anything else!
In 1871, Harvard University started to play a variation known as the
Boston Game.
This game allowed a player to scoop up the ball and run with it, if he were chased, varying from the game that had been prohibited in 1840.
In the fall of 1873, Yale invited Harvard, Princeton, Columbia and Rutgers to a convention in New York to draw up a set of rules for an intercollegiate football association. Harvard shunned the meeting because the proposed association would not consider the rules of the Boston Game.
It, nevertheless, challenged Yale to a game in 1874. Yale, however, played a game resembling soccer and thus declined because of the different rules. Harvard captain Henry Grant was anxious for his football team to engage in competition and had heard that a similar game was played at McGill University. Consequently, he contacted the captain of the McGill team, David Roger, and invited them to play two games in Cambridge, Massachusetts, on May 13-14, 1874. These were to be the first-ever North American-style football games.
Until this time, Harvard had been playing a game that today would be considered very similar to what we call soccer.
McGill arrived in Cambridge several days prior to the game and practiced each day. The Harvard team was surprised when the McGill players kicked the ball and subsequently ran with it under their arms. The Harvard captain pointed out politely that this violated a basic rule of American football.
The McGill captain replied that it did not violate any rule of the Canadian game. When asked,
What game do you play?
Roger replied, Rugby.
They then managed to agree to play the forthcoming games with half-Canadian, Half-American rules.
The following day, a notice appeared in the Harvard University paper:
The McGill University Football Club will meet the Harvard Football Club on Jarvis field, Wednesday and Thursday, May 13th and 14th. The game probably will be called at 3 o’clock. Admittance 50 cents. The proceeds will be donated to the entertainment of our visitors from Montreal.
Early in the first half, the Harvard team so enjoyed running with the ball that they agreed to play the remainder of the game with the Canadian rules, which stipulated that the ball could be picked up and carried. Harvard normally played with 15 players, but McGill could only field 11 men so the Boston team agreed to use 11 athletes (the number now fielded in the present game of American football).
The first meeting was won by Harvard 3-0 and the game played on the following day ended in a scoreless tie. Harvard liked the McGill game so much that it adopted the McGill rules, which gave credit for touchdowns as well as field goals. These rule changes, which included tackling, let inevitably to the physical contact of our present day collision sport.
In the fall of 1875, Harvard challenged York to a match and suggested the use of a set of rules combining soccer and rugby, such as Harvard had learned form its Canadian rival the previous year. The game was eventually played under a combination of both soccer and rugby rules, but Yale apparently won the concession of using a round, rather than oval football. Harvard’s triumph over Yale at this so-called Concessionary Game, was witnessed by a Sss-boom-bah cheering crowd of 2,000 spectators, bedecked in coloured shirts, stockings, and knee breeches.
Harvard went on to play McGill again in Cambridge and in Montreal in 1876, ’77, ’79 and ’82, winning all the games. Then, a century later, on October 19, 1974, McGill made its comeback. The McGill rugby team (which most closely resembles the team that participated in the original matches) challenged Harvard, beating them 6-3. This centennial game led to an annual Covo Cup match between the Harvard and McGill rugby teams in a spirit that is reminiscent of those first college games.
Having allegedly evolved during the Danish occupation of England where belligerent Anglo-Saxons kicked Viking skulls from village to village, football, of a slightly less bellicose sort, was imported to the New World by 17th and 18th century colonists.
In 1840, a reporter wrote of a Yale University game:
If the truth were told, the game would make the same impression on the public mind as a bullfight. Boys and young men knocked each other down and tore off each other’s clothing. Eyes were bunged, faces blackened, much blood was spilt and shirts and coats were torn to rags.
By 1860, the game was abolished in many American schools, but in 1862, Gerrit Smith Hiller organized a group at Yale to play again, using rules that were a reasonable close imitation of soccer. Still, the game was often more an excuse to beat up freshmen than anything else!
In 1871, Harvard University started to play a variation known as the
Boston Game.
This game allowed a player to scoop up the ball and run with it, if he were chased, varying from the game that had been prohibited in 1840.
In the fall of 1873, Yale invited Harvard, Princeton, Columbia and Rutgers to a convention in New York to draw up a set of rules for an intercollegiate football association. Harvard shunned the meeting because the proposed association would not consider the rules of the Boston Game.
It, nevertheless, challenged Yale to a game in 1874. Yale, however, played a game resembling soccer and thus declined because of the different rules. Harvard captain Henry Grant was anxious for his football team to engage in competition and had heard that a similar game was played at McGill University. Consequently, he contacted the captain of the McGill team, David Roger, and invited them to play two games in Cambridge, Massachusetts, on May 13-14, 1874. These were to be the first-ever North American-style football games.
Until this time, Harvard had been playing a game that today would be considered very similar to what we call soccer.
McGill arrived in Cambridge several days prior to the game and practiced each day. The Harvard team was surprised when the McGill players kicked the ball and subsequently ran with it under their arms. The Harvard captain pointed out politely that this violated a basic rule of American football.
The McGill captain replied that it did not violate any rule of the Canadian game. When asked,
What game do you play?
Roger replied, Rugby.
They then managed to agree to play the forthcoming games with half-Canadian, Half-American rules.
The following day, a notice appeared in the Harvard University paper:
The McGill University Football Club will meet the Harvard Football Club on Jarvis field, Wednesday and Thursday, May 13th and 14th. The game probably will be called at 3 o’clock. Admittance 50 cents. The proceeds will be donated to the entertainment of our visitors from Montreal.
Early in the first half, the Harvard team so enjoyed running with the ball that they agreed to play the remainder of the game with the Canadian rules, which stipulated that the ball could be picked up and carried. Harvard normally played with 15 players, but McGill could only field 11 men so the Boston team agreed to use 11 athletes (the number now fielded in the present game of American football).
The first meeting was won by Harvard 3-0 and the game played on the following day ended in a scoreless tie. Harvard liked the McGill game so much that it adopted the McGill rules, which gave credit for touchdowns as well as field goals. These rule changes, which included tackling, let inevitably to the physical contact of our present day collision sport.
In the fall of 1875, Harvard challenged York to a match and suggested the use of a set of rules combining soccer and rugby, such as Harvard had learned form its Canadian rival the previous year. The game was eventually played under a combination of both soccer and rugby rules, but Yale apparently won the concession of using a round, rather than oval football. Harvard’s triumph over Yale at this so-called Concessionary Game, was witnessed by a Sss-boom-bah cheering crowd of 2,000 spectators, bedecked in coloured shirts, stockings, and knee breeches.
Harvard went on to play McGill again in Cambridge and in Montreal in 1876, ’77, ’79 and ’82, winning all the games. Then, a century later, on October 19, 1974, McGill made its comeback. The McGill rugby team (which most closely resembles the team that participated in the original matches) challenged Harvard, beating them 6-3. This centennial game led to an annual Covo Cup match between the Harvard and McGill rugby teams in a spirit that is reminiscent of those first college games.
