Interesting read. I'll allow those more creative than me make the barbs, jabs and such. Looking forward to it. Please don't politicize.
https://www.post-gazette.com/sports...-Sutherland-George-Halas/stories/202003260087
The link has some nice graphics and newspaper images. Below is the text...
Pop Warner, World War I and the 1918 flu pandemic: How Pitt claimed a national title
The 1918 influenza outbreak shortened Pitt's season, and the war precipitated a matchup with Georgia Tech — one that led to national accolades
March 26, 2020 9:17 AM
By John McGonigal / Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
Ralph S. Davis, the sports editor of The Pittsburgh Press from 1905 to 1930, wrote a daily column. He picked a topic — Lou Gehrig’s impending contract, Connie Mack’s umpire complaints, whatever — and expounded on it, later adding in a few unrelated quips to fill the space.
In the Press’ Oct. 18, 1918 edition, one of Davis’ tidbits had a headline: “Today’s grid score,” as in gridiron football, with the following underneath:
BOARD OF HEALTH — 1000.
PITT, ETC. — 0.
That was the state of affairs at the time, with cities quarantined and sports delayed. Sound familiar?
The 1918 flu pandemic — and World War I raging on European soil — halted or, in some cases, canceled college football seasons. The timeline was different, with the spread of COVID-19 axing March and April practices and a spring game, not entire fall slates. But there are similarities in how the two viruses shut down everyday life and the sports world.
And if Pitt’s current football players — cooped up, training at home and taking classes online — need an example of how to come out of a quarantine on the up and up, look no further than the press clippings from 102 years ago.
In a shortened 1918 season, with all five games played in November, Pitt won its third national championship. Or at least a third claimednational championship. There wasn’t a College Football Playoff or BCS system to determine a solo champion, not even a widely accepted Associated Press poll that stood alone. But two “major selectors” — the Helms Athletic Foundation and the Houlgate System — picked Pitt over Michigan, and the National Championship Foundation dubbed the Panthers and Wolverines as co-champions.
Michigan was 5-0 to Pitt’s 4-1 record. But Glenn “Pop” Warner’s Panthers held the trump card: A convincing win against John Heisman’s Georgia Tech, a team that carried a 33-game winning streak, won the 1917 national title and famously beat Cumberland College 222-0 two years prior in the most lopsided game in college football history.
Heisman, who has his name etched on a pretty important trophy, was instrumental in legalizing the forward pass. Warner is responsible for not only every town’s youth football league, but also the single and double wing formations and the three-point stance. Pitt vs. Georgia Tech, North vs. South, Warner vs. Heisman was a monumental matchup to all but decide the 1918 title. And it happened because of two circumstances above the innovators’ pay grades: the war and the flu.
“OCTOBER FOOTBALL IS BANNED” — Sept. 28, 1918, The Pittsburgh Press
That headline was mostly true.
Col. Robert L. Rees was in charge of the Student Army Training Corps, an organization that was created to train soldiers on college campuses, including Pitt. Football players across the country were in the S.A.T.C., and they were required to do military drills throughout the week while studying and practicing with their respective teams.
Involvement in the S.A.T.C. wasn’t supposed to affect the 1918 football season. With the schedules already set, Warner, Heisman and prominent coaches along the east coast — as well as Walter Camp, the well-known “father of American football” even then — met in Philadelphia in June 1918 to confirm their plans to play football despite the ongoing war efforts.
However, a few days before the S.A.T.C. officially began on Oct. 1, Rees issued a new War Department edict: Football players were prohibited from leaving campus during the month of October, except for Saturday afternoons. This statement, which all but canceled or postponed long trips, was in line with the S.A.T.C.’s strict travel restrictions. Still, Pitt officials were said to be “greatly surprised” by the news, assuming Rees was “strong for football, and would do nothing to interfere with the games as arranged.”
Pitt was supposed to play at Syracuse on Oct. 19. That wasn’t going to happen. Penn’s trip to Forbes Field on Oct. 26 — a journey from Philadelphia that’d be impossible to do in a day a century ago — was also unlikely.
There was a bit of hope that Pitt could play in October. The Panthers’ first game on the schedule was against the Great Lakes Navy Bluejackets, a team that featured George Halas, the eventual founder of the Chicago Bears. The Bluejackets arrived in Pittsburgh ahead of their Oct. 5 meeting with Pitt because they were members of a Navy boot camp, not the S.A.T.C. They weren’t hamstrung by the same travel restrictions.
Great Lakes coach Herman “Bo” Olcott and his staff actually met with Pitt officials and Panthers captain George McLaren on the Friday before the scheduled contest. One of Olcott’s assistant coaches reportedly looked over McLaren, Pitt’s All-American fullback, and said: “We certainly would like to have given you a good walloping.”
Note the tense. Would like to have. The Great Lakes never had the chance to make good on their trash talk — and McLaren didn’t get the opportunity to square off with Halas.
“OPENING DATE NOW IN DOUBT” — Oct. 5, 1918, The Pittsburgh Press
The 1918 flu, known as the “Spanish flu” because it received greater press attention in war-neutral Spain, infected over 500 million people worldwide and caused anywhere from 17 to 50 million (and possibly 100 million) deaths over a two-year span. The pandemic affected major cities across the country, including Pittsburgh, which succumbed to the virus in October 1918.
Philadelphia, which had its first influenza diagnosis on Sept. 18 of that year, was hit hard with hundreds hospitalized, prompting Pennsylvania’s acting health commissioner B. Franklin Royer into action. On Oct. 4, Royer ordered all places of amusement to close in an effort to slow the spread of the flu. Saloons, movie theaters and playhouses were temporarily shut down. Mass gatherings were not allowed. And college football games were canceled.
Pitt did not play the Great Lakes Navy Bluejackets on Oct. 5, as scheduled. Instead, Warner and his players were left wondering if they’d play football in 1918.
“Gridiron affairs at the university are all up in the air,” the Press published, “as a result of the city health authorities’ order banning all outdoor and indoor assemblages, because of the fear of an epidemic of Spanish influenza, and the quarantine established over the S.A.T.C. students at Pitt.”
The same article noted that Pitt would refund the money for tickets purchased in advance for the Bluejackets game. Pitt could have made up to $5,000 in sales on the game, and the athletic department officially lost several hundred dollars it had spent on advertisements and other logistics.
That was the least of Warner’s worries, though.
His Pitt players practiced during the S.A.T.C. quarantine and ban against outdoor gatherings. According to the Press’ Oct. 7 issue, the Panthers practiced against the United States Training Detachment of Camp Pitt. It was during that session that sophomore Herb McCracken, a Sewickley High star, first stood out. He went on to a College Football Hall of Fame career, winning a national championship as a head coach with Lafayette in 1926.
McCracken wasn’t the only College Football Hall of Famer on that 1918 squad, either. Pitt missed Jock Sutherland, the legendary end and eventual Panthers coach, who served in the military. But McLaren and All-American halfback Tom Davies — who shined as a freshman thanks to an amended rule to gift first-year players eligibility — also earned induction decades later.
Add fellow All-American halfback “Katy” Easterday into the mix, and Pitt boasted a potent offensive attack — one that eventually had the opportunity to show off.
“PITT MAY PLAY GEORGIA TECH” — Oct. 22, 1918, The Pittsburgh Press
By the end of October, the number of patients from influenza decreased nationwide and quarantines were lifted. The flu returned in 1919 in another virulent wave. But for the time being, life was back to relative normalcy, and athletic departments were looking to pack the football schedules.
In October, Princeton head coach Bill Roper approached Karl Eugene Davis, Pitt’s athletic director, about hosting a game at Forbes Field to benefit the United War Work Fund — a campaign to raise money and provide entertainment for American troops abroad in World War I. Davis agreed to play “any team in the country.” But he apparently made it clear Pitt wanted Georgia Tech, known then as the “Golden Tornadoes.”
“The local authorities are very willing — even eager — to try conclusions with the Georgians,” the Press wrote. “Nothing would be more to their liking than a test of strength between the two famous machines.”
The Great Lakes Navy Bluejackets were Pitt’s second choice, but that wasn’t necessary. Georgia Tech agreed to play.
It should be noted that when Heisman’s Georgia Tech accepted Pitt’s invitation, the Golden Tornadoes were already three games into their campaign. The defending national champions weren’t forced inside via quarantine, defeating Clemson 28-0 in their season opener on Oct. 5 and routing Furman and the “11th Cavalry” by a combined score of 241-0 — yes, that’s 241 — in subsequent weeks.
In addition, the Golden Tornadoes were supposed to host Camp Greenleaf, a medical officer training camp in Georgia, prior to playing Pitt. But Georgia Tech called off the game, inoculating the team as a preventative measure against influenza, the Pittsburgh Gazette Times wrote on Nov. 1. Why does that matter? Jock Sutherland and a few more former Pitt stars were stationed at Camp Greenleaf and played on the team. Warner expected a scouting report after the game. Not quite an All-22, but it would’ve helped.
Regardless, Pitt prepared for the Golden Tornadoes by blowing out Washington & Jefferson, 34-0, and Penn, 37-0, on Nov. 9 and 16, respectively. Heisman attended the latter game at Forbes Field, watching as Davies — Pitt’s standout halfback from the Kiski School — ran “in a manner which simply mystified the blue-jersied warriors from the East,” Pittsburgh Gazette Times sports editor Richard Guy wrote.
It served as a sign of things to come.
“GEORGIA TECH HERE TO MEET PITT” — Nov. 23, 1918, Pittsburgh Gazette Times
Rarely is it ideal for a journalist to begin a story with a quote. But sometimes, it’s too perfect not to.
From Guy’s Georgia Tech preview story in the Pittsburgh Gazette Times’ Nov. 23 edition:
“The game tomorrow will be decided in the first quarter of play,” declared Coach Heisman of the Georgia Tech eleven in making a forecast of the championship contest yesterday afternoon at Forbes Field. “If the Pitt team does not whip my men in the first 15 minutes I doubt if it will do it at all. I am fearful only of one thing, and that is stage fright on the part of my men, that is all.”
Heisman made that statement after arriving in Pittsburgh with his 25 players and 145 fans the Friday night before Saturday’s clash. The Georgia Tech travel party’s trip via train took almost two days, going from Atlanta to Cincinnati over to Pittsburgh. The Golden Tornadoes and their supporters stayed at the William Penn Hotel downtown, then only two years old.
Inside the hotel the day before kick, Guy’s piece paints a picture of a “typical football throng,” with people gambling on the game. The Panthers were expected to win. Guy wrote that even Georgia Tech’s fans admitted probable defeat, “for all they could think of seemingly was the team of last year, if they only had last year’s team here to play Pitt.” The line fluctuated depending on who you went to, but the away fans demanded at least Georgia Tech plus-14 to consider betting.
“When the Pitt students came to meet the Southern coin they balked at the odds,” Guy wrote. “But the professional bettors did not.”
And with reason.
Pitt triumphed, 32-0. The victory, highlighted by Davies’ three touchdowns, ended Georgia Tech’s lengthy winning streak and pushed the Panthers’ unbeaten run to 32 games.
The game was apparently closer than the score might’ve indicated, with Robert “Tiny” Maxwell writing that the final tally was “misleading.” Maxwell — who, like Heisman, also has a pretty prominent college football award named after him — was a former Swarthmore College star and actually officiated the high-profile contest. He gave Warner props for calling a variety of reverses and a double-pass that led to a touchdown.
“The men of Warner deserve high praise,” Maxwell wrote in The Pittsburgh Press, “for the wonderful victory which virtually clinches the championship of the United States.”
Pitt had games left on the schedule. Five days after beating Heisman, Warner and the Panthers ousted Penn State, 28-6, at Forbes Field. And two days after that, Pitt traveled to Ohio to face the Cleveland Naval Reserve. There, the Panthers lost for the first time in Warner’s tenure, but not without controversy.
Pitt’s coach and journalists reporting on the game, including Guy, insisted that the Panthers were robbed by the officials. The referees claimed the timekeeper’s watch was broken, which ended the first half early before Pitt could score and extended the fourth quarter to allow the Reserves enough time to take a game-sealing 10-9 lead.
Still, the Panthers were crowned national champions for the third time in four years, and nothing could take that from them. LOL!
Not a war, and not a deadly pandemic.
John McGonigal: jmcgonigal@post-gazette.com and Twitter @jmcgonigal9
https://www.post-gazette.com/sports...-Sutherland-George-Halas/stories/202003260087
The link has some nice graphics and newspaper images. Below is the text...
Pop Warner, World War I and the 1918 flu pandemic: How Pitt claimed a national title
The 1918 influenza outbreak shortened Pitt's season, and the war precipitated a matchup with Georgia Tech — one that led to national accolades
March 26, 2020 9:17 AM
By John McGonigal / Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
Ralph S. Davis, the sports editor of The Pittsburgh Press from 1905 to 1930, wrote a daily column. He picked a topic — Lou Gehrig’s impending contract, Connie Mack’s umpire complaints, whatever — and expounded on it, later adding in a few unrelated quips to fill the space.
In the Press’ Oct. 18, 1918 edition, one of Davis’ tidbits had a headline: “Today’s grid score,” as in gridiron football, with the following underneath:
BOARD OF HEALTH — 1000.
PITT, ETC. — 0.
That was the state of affairs at the time, with cities quarantined and sports delayed. Sound familiar?
The 1918 flu pandemic — and World War I raging on European soil — halted or, in some cases, canceled college football seasons. The timeline was different, with the spread of COVID-19 axing March and April practices and a spring game, not entire fall slates. But there are similarities in how the two viruses shut down everyday life and the sports world.
And if Pitt’s current football players — cooped up, training at home and taking classes online — need an example of how to come out of a quarantine on the up and up, look no further than the press clippings from 102 years ago.
In a shortened 1918 season, with all five games played in November, Pitt won its third national championship. Or at least a third claimednational championship. There wasn’t a College Football Playoff or BCS system to determine a solo champion, not even a widely accepted Associated Press poll that stood alone. But two “major selectors” — the Helms Athletic Foundation and the Houlgate System — picked Pitt over Michigan, and the National Championship Foundation dubbed the Panthers and Wolverines as co-champions.
Michigan was 5-0 to Pitt’s 4-1 record. But Glenn “Pop” Warner’s Panthers held the trump card: A convincing win against John Heisman’s Georgia Tech, a team that carried a 33-game winning streak, won the 1917 national title and famously beat Cumberland College 222-0 two years prior in the most lopsided game in college football history.
Heisman, who has his name etched on a pretty important trophy, was instrumental in legalizing the forward pass. Warner is responsible for not only every town’s youth football league, but also the single and double wing formations and the three-point stance. Pitt vs. Georgia Tech, North vs. South, Warner vs. Heisman was a monumental matchup to all but decide the 1918 title. And it happened because of two circumstances above the innovators’ pay grades: the war and the flu.
“OCTOBER FOOTBALL IS BANNED” — Sept. 28, 1918, The Pittsburgh Press
That headline was mostly true.
Col. Robert L. Rees was in charge of the Student Army Training Corps, an organization that was created to train soldiers on college campuses, including Pitt. Football players across the country were in the S.A.T.C., and they were required to do military drills throughout the week while studying and practicing with their respective teams.
Involvement in the S.A.T.C. wasn’t supposed to affect the 1918 football season. With the schedules already set, Warner, Heisman and prominent coaches along the east coast — as well as Walter Camp, the well-known “father of American football” even then — met in Philadelphia in June 1918 to confirm their plans to play football despite the ongoing war efforts.
However, a few days before the S.A.T.C. officially began on Oct. 1, Rees issued a new War Department edict: Football players were prohibited from leaving campus during the month of October, except for Saturday afternoons. This statement, which all but canceled or postponed long trips, was in line with the S.A.T.C.’s strict travel restrictions. Still, Pitt officials were said to be “greatly surprised” by the news, assuming Rees was “strong for football, and would do nothing to interfere with the games as arranged.”
Pitt was supposed to play at Syracuse on Oct. 19. That wasn’t going to happen. Penn’s trip to Forbes Field on Oct. 26 — a journey from Philadelphia that’d be impossible to do in a day a century ago — was also unlikely.
There was a bit of hope that Pitt could play in October. The Panthers’ first game on the schedule was against the Great Lakes Navy Bluejackets, a team that featured George Halas, the eventual founder of the Chicago Bears. The Bluejackets arrived in Pittsburgh ahead of their Oct. 5 meeting with Pitt because they were members of a Navy boot camp, not the S.A.T.C. They weren’t hamstrung by the same travel restrictions.
Great Lakes coach Herman “Bo” Olcott and his staff actually met with Pitt officials and Panthers captain George McLaren on the Friday before the scheduled contest. One of Olcott’s assistant coaches reportedly looked over McLaren, Pitt’s All-American fullback, and said: “We certainly would like to have given you a good walloping.”
Note the tense. Would like to have. The Great Lakes never had the chance to make good on their trash talk — and McLaren didn’t get the opportunity to square off with Halas.
“OPENING DATE NOW IN DOUBT” — Oct. 5, 1918, The Pittsburgh Press
The 1918 flu, known as the “Spanish flu” because it received greater press attention in war-neutral Spain, infected over 500 million people worldwide and caused anywhere from 17 to 50 million (and possibly 100 million) deaths over a two-year span. The pandemic affected major cities across the country, including Pittsburgh, which succumbed to the virus in October 1918.
Philadelphia, which had its first influenza diagnosis on Sept. 18 of that year, was hit hard with hundreds hospitalized, prompting Pennsylvania’s acting health commissioner B. Franklin Royer into action. On Oct. 4, Royer ordered all places of amusement to close in an effort to slow the spread of the flu. Saloons, movie theaters and playhouses were temporarily shut down. Mass gatherings were not allowed. And college football games were canceled.
Pitt did not play the Great Lakes Navy Bluejackets on Oct. 5, as scheduled. Instead, Warner and his players were left wondering if they’d play football in 1918.
“Gridiron affairs at the university are all up in the air,” the Press published, “as a result of the city health authorities’ order banning all outdoor and indoor assemblages, because of the fear of an epidemic of Spanish influenza, and the quarantine established over the S.A.T.C. students at Pitt.”
The same article noted that Pitt would refund the money for tickets purchased in advance for the Bluejackets game. Pitt could have made up to $5,000 in sales on the game, and the athletic department officially lost several hundred dollars it had spent on advertisements and other logistics.
That was the least of Warner’s worries, though.
His Pitt players practiced during the S.A.T.C. quarantine and ban against outdoor gatherings. According to the Press’ Oct. 7 issue, the Panthers practiced against the United States Training Detachment of Camp Pitt. It was during that session that sophomore Herb McCracken, a Sewickley High star, first stood out. He went on to a College Football Hall of Fame career, winning a national championship as a head coach with Lafayette in 1926.
McCracken wasn’t the only College Football Hall of Famer on that 1918 squad, either. Pitt missed Jock Sutherland, the legendary end and eventual Panthers coach, who served in the military. But McLaren and All-American halfback Tom Davies — who shined as a freshman thanks to an amended rule to gift first-year players eligibility — also earned induction decades later.
Add fellow All-American halfback “Katy” Easterday into the mix, and Pitt boasted a potent offensive attack — one that eventually had the opportunity to show off.
“PITT MAY PLAY GEORGIA TECH” — Oct. 22, 1918, The Pittsburgh Press
By the end of October, the number of patients from influenza decreased nationwide and quarantines were lifted. The flu returned in 1919 in another virulent wave. But for the time being, life was back to relative normalcy, and athletic departments were looking to pack the football schedules.
In October, Princeton head coach Bill Roper approached Karl Eugene Davis, Pitt’s athletic director, about hosting a game at Forbes Field to benefit the United War Work Fund — a campaign to raise money and provide entertainment for American troops abroad in World War I. Davis agreed to play “any team in the country.” But he apparently made it clear Pitt wanted Georgia Tech, known then as the “Golden Tornadoes.”
“The local authorities are very willing — even eager — to try conclusions with the Georgians,” the Press wrote. “Nothing would be more to their liking than a test of strength between the two famous machines.”
The Great Lakes Navy Bluejackets were Pitt’s second choice, but that wasn’t necessary. Georgia Tech agreed to play.
It should be noted that when Heisman’s Georgia Tech accepted Pitt’s invitation, the Golden Tornadoes were already three games into their campaign. The defending national champions weren’t forced inside via quarantine, defeating Clemson 28-0 in their season opener on Oct. 5 and routing Furman and the “11th Cavalry” by a combined score of 241-0 — yes, that’s 241 — in subsequent weeks.
In addition, the Golden Tornadoes were supposed to host Camp Greenleaf, a medical officer training camp in Georgia, prior to playing Pitt. But Georgia Tech called off the game, inoculating the team as a preventative measure against influenza, the Pittsburgh Gazette Times wrote on Nov. 1. Why does that matter? Jock Sutherland and a few more former Pitt stars were stationed at Camp Greenleaf and played on the team. Warner expected a scouting report after the game. Not quite an All-22, but it would’ve helped.
Regardless, Pitt prepared for the Golden Tornadoes by blowing out Washington & Jefferson, 34-0, and Penn, 37-0, on Nov. 9 and 16, respectively. Heisman attended the latter game at Forbes Field, watching as Davies — Pitt’s standout halfback from the Kiski School — ran “in a manner which simply mystified the blue-jersied warriors from the East,” Pittsburgh Gazette Times sports editor Richard Guy wrote.
It served as a sign of things to come.
“GEORGIA TECH HERE TO MEET PITT” — Nov. 23, 1918, Pittsburgh Gazette Times
Rarely is it ideal for a journalist to begin a story with a quote. But sometimes, it’s too perfect not to.
From Guy’s Georgia Tech preview story in the Pittsburgh Gazette Times’ Nov. 23 edition:
“The game tomorrow will be decided in the first quarter of play,” declared Coach Heisman of the Georgia Tech eleven in making a forecast of the championship contest yesterday afternoon at Forbes Field. “If the Pitt team does not whip my men in the first 15 minutes I doubt if it will do it at all. I am fearful only of one thing, and that is stage fright on the part of my men, that is all.”
Heisman made that statement after arriving in Pittsburgh with his 25 players and 145 fans the Friday night before Saturday’s clash. The Georgia Tech travel party’s trip via train took almost two days, going from Atlanta to Cincinnati over to Pittsburgh. The Golden Tornadoes and their supporters stayed at the William Penn Hotel downtown, then only two years old.
Inside the hotel the day before kick, Guy’s piece paints a picture of a “typical football throng,” with people gambling on the game. The Panthers were expected to win. Guy wrote that even Georgia Tech’s fans admitted probable defeat, “for all they could think of seemingly was the team of last year, if they only had last year’s team here to play Pitt.” The line fluctuated depending on who you went to, but the away fans demanded at least Georgia Tech plus-14 to consider betting.
“When the Pitt students came to meet the Southern coin they balked at the odds,” Guy wrote. “But the professional bettors did not.”
And with reason.
Pitt triumphed, 32-0. The victory, highlighted by Davies’ three touchdowns, ended Georgia Tech’s lengthy winning streak and pushed the Panthers’ unbeaten run to 32 games.
The game was apparently closer than the score might’ve indicated, with Robert “Tiny” Maxwell writing that the final tally was “misleading.” Maxwell — who, like Heisman, also has a pretty prominent college football award named after him — was a former Swarthmore College star and actually officiated the high-profile contest. He gave Warner props for calling a variety of reverses and a double-pass that led to a touchdown.
“The men of Warner deserve high praise,” Maxwell wrote in The Pittsburgh Press, “for the wonderful victory which virtually clinches the championship of the United States.”
Pitt had games left on the schedule. Five days after beating Heisman, Warner and the Panthers ousted Penn State, 28-6, at Forbes Field. And two days after that, Pitt traveled to Ohio to face the Cleveland Naval Reserve. There, the Panthers lost for the first time in Warner’s tenure, but not without controversy.
Pitt’s coach and journalists reporting on the game, including Guy, insisted that the Panthers were robbed by the officials. The referees claimed the timekeeper’s watch was broken, which ended the first half early before Pitt could score and extended the fourth quarter to allow the Reserves enough time to take a game-sealing 10-9 lead.
Still, the Panthers were crowned national champions for the third time in four years, and nothing could take that from them. LOL!
Not a war, and not a deadly pandemic.
John McGonigal: jmcgonigal@post-gazette.com and Twitter @jmcgonigal9
