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| First football helmet for college football |
This textbook contained a lot of good information on what was happening in this time period besides college football. People were having more leisure time than ever before and didn't know what to do with it, that's why football games were so popular to audiences and men.
Timeline History of Football Pads
This site shows a lot about how dangerous football used to be. The pads were very thin and they didn't even wear helmets until 1915. It shows how pads changed over time and became more thick because of the dangers.
Journal of Sport History (Spring 1993)
This Journal had a lot of good information about how dangerous football was. It talks a lot about a formation called the "flying wedge" and how effective it was against teams but at the same time how dangerous it was. The journal was very detailed and helped me get some information i couldn't find about the specifics of the "flying wedge".
History of Football Dangers
This New York Times post wrote about how people tried to make football more of an official sport and made it more safe. It also shows how much people cared about keeping it the same because it wasn't "manly"if they passed the ball or no one was injured.
National Collegiate Athletic Association
The NCAA was founded in 1906 to try and make football safer for all the players. The NCAA changed the rules and gave football a structure. I found some good information I needed on the NCAA that I needed to explain how they tried to make the game safer.
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| Football Players in 1904-1905 in the "flying wedge" formation without helmets |
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| Theodore Roosevelt who had a lot to do with the improving the safety of football |
The dangers of College football when it was first played, were mostly overlooked because of the demand for leisure activities and the masculinity and toughness that men wanted to have. Football is a very dangerous sport especially after the creation of the “flying wedge” and the sport was almost discontinued after multiple deaths but it has a lot to do with the character of men. Football was a huge part of the 1880-1920s because of how popular it became.
Football attracted many men to watch and play because of the great amount of leisure time they had which they weren’t used to before. The salaries of middle class people and working class people rose very quickly during this time period. Industrial workers came up with this slogan “Eight hours for work, eight hours for rest, and eight hours for what we will.” Men weren’t used to all this leisure time, and most men wouldn't want to go shopping with the women, so they had to find something else to do. That’s why football easily attracted many men because it was something to do because women had many things to do with the new chain stores and mass marketing. Another huge reason that football was such an attractive pastime to so many men wasn’t only because of there new amounts of leisure time but also because men loved to be masculine and “manly”
To be masculine was everything to the men, that’s why football was so appealing to the men of this time period. Like Theodore Roosevelt once said, “A leader can’t be efficient unless he’s manly.” This shows that the leaders of them promoted manliness as a huge necessity for men and that they wouldn’t be able to achieve anything without it. Thorpe who was the gold standard of all-around athletic performance for generations also exemplified the manliness that men wanted. He kicked four field goals in a game even with his leg injured very badly and just fought through the huge amount of pain. Later he was asked if he ever worried about injuries in football, which he reportedly replied asking how it was even possible to get injured in football. But football injures began to worsen especially when the “flying wedge was created
Football when it was first created was more dangerous than ever because the lack of pads and helmets and also because the rules were not completely set in stone. Football players only wore very thin shoulder pads that were created in 1877 that barely protected them and had no helmets until 1915. Once the “flying wedge” was created, football got a lot more dangerous. In the season after it was created 20 football players were killed and hundreds were severely injured. The “flying wedge” was a formation where ten men would make a “V” formation and would sprint at full speed and hit one defender with the ball carrier right behind. This play was almost always very effective and couldn't be stopped until a huge gain of yards. Because of the massive amount of injuries that the flying wedge brought fourth many safety measures were soon created to try and make the game safer.
Football being so dangerous and “manly” was great but at the same time it still needed to be a little safer. Some colleges and universities wanted to discontinue the sport because of the many injures and even some deaths. Theodore Roosevelt said “I would a hundred fold rather keep the game as it is now, with brutality, than give it up.” Theodore was obviously a huge promoter of manliness and of football but he also knew that the game had to take some safety measurements. He gathered college athletic leaders to get together and talk about how to make the game safer, and they created the NCAA (National College Athletic Association). This organization created many rules and gave the sport a back bone. It banded the diving tackles and a certain number of players had to be on the line of scrimmage. A NY times post talked about how safe football is today compared to 1910. The post talked about how recently football mad a decision to punish players for helmet-to-helmet hits because of the chance of a concussion, while in 1910 rules were changed because of horrifying deaths.
Football is a very dangerous sport but the danger is part of it. “Men will be Men” and they will look past all the dangers because it’s what men are expected to do.
