These Drexel Institute Yearbooks represent only three years, but may be of some use to someone.
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It is the mission of The Unbalanced Line Online Library to present important and interesting historical texts to college football fans. Items will be added regularly as blog postings and can be easily indexed in the Yearbooks button on the site bar.
Copyrighted material is used expressly under the fair use guidelines of U.S. Code 17 #107 through #118 stating that the criticism, comment, news reporting, educational use or research of copyrighted material is not held in violation of copyright laws.
_______________ © 2009 The Unbalanced Line _______________
Yearbook: Drexel
Friday, August 21, 2009
Yearbook: Pitt Owl
As a graduate of the University of Pittsburgh the Pitt Owl was my first experience with scanned online yearbooks. Pitt Archives Services Center made a very nice searchable page that makes it easy to find the content you're looking for.
I suggest searching for text and navigating the pages with the reader's navigation bar at the top of each page. Also note the (+ - ) zoom buttons on the same navigation bar.
Ditka
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It is the mission of The Unbalanced Line Online Library to present important and interesting historical texts to college football fans. Items will be added regularly as blog postings and can be easily indexed in the Yearbooks button on the site bar.
Copyrighted material is used expressly under the fair use guidelines of U.S. Code 17 #107 through #118 stating that the criticism, comment, news reporting, educational use or research of copyrighted material is not held in violation of copyright laws.
_______________ © 2009 The Unbalanced Line _______________
Yearbook: Rutgers Scarlet Letter
Just getting these rolling, but I promise a lot more content as I get more time.
Rutgers has available an archive of their Scarlet Letter a fraternity publication that usually provided postseason summaries of their football team. Use the search bar in the reader to find any football relevant sections, that is, unless you graduated from Rutgers in 1918 and want to look up a composite of your pledge class.
Yearbooks are a great way to experience the cultural climate surrounding early college football teams and I hope to provide a collection of those here.
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It is the mission of The Unbalanced Line Online Library to present important and interesting historical texts to college football fans. Items will be added regularly as blog postings and can be easily indexed in the Yearbooks button on the site bar.
Copyrighted material is used expressly under the fair use guidelines of U.S. Code 17 #107 through #118 stating that the criticism, comment, news reporting, educational use or research of copyrighted material is not held in violation of copyright laws.
_______________ © 2009 The Unbalanced Line _______________
Library
vol. 2 Aug. 21
I believe this is a limited view of College Football: History, Spectacle, Controversy
By John Sayle Watterson © JHU Press 2002
(Amazon.com)
I'll preface the embedded book by examining a relevant abstract. Please note the historical position given to the ties mentioned in the abstract. One of the things I will talk about going forward is the useless addition of overtime in lieu of ties in college football. While this library installment isn't a complete volume, I thought the pages that Google previews are very interesting. Try using the search box on the reader as a quick reference of your favorite teams.
Book overview
"In March [1892] Stanford and California had played the first college football game on the Pacific Coast in San Francisco... The pregame activities included a noisy parade down streets bedecked with school colors. Tickets sold so fast that the Stanford student manager, future president Herbert Hoover, and his California counterpart, could not keep count of the gold and silver coins. When they finally totaled up the proceeds, they found that the revenues amounted to $30,000--a fair haul for a game that had to be temporarily postponed because no one had thought to bring a ball!"--from College Football: History, Spectacle, Controversy, Chapter Three
In this comprehensive history of America's popular pastime, John Sayle Watterson shows how college football in more than one hundred years has evolved from a simple game played by college students into a lucrative, semiprofessional enterprise. With a historian's grasp of the context and a novelist's eye for the telling detail, Watterson presents a compelling portrait rich in anecdotes, colorful personalities, and troubling patterns. He tells how the infamous Yale-Princeton "fiasco" of 1881, in which Yale forced a 0-0 tie in a championship game by retaining possession of the ball for the entire game, eventually led to the first-down rule that would begin to transform Americanized rugby into American football. He describes the kicks and punches, gouged eyes, broken collarbones, and flagrant rule violations that nearly led to the sport's demise (including such excesses as a Yale player who wore a uniform soaked in blood from a slaughterhouse). And he explains the reforms of 1910, which gave official approval to a radical new tactic traditionalists were sure would doom the game as they knew it--the forward pass.
As college football grew in the booming economy of the 1920s, Watterson explains, the flow of cash added fuel to an already explosive mix. Coaches like Knute Rockne became celebrities in their own right, with highly paid speaking engagements and product endorsements. At the same time, the emergence of the first professional teams led to inevitable scandals involving recruitment and subsidies for student-athletes. Revelations of illicit aid to athletes in the 1930s led to failed attempts at reform by the fledgling NCAA in the postwar "Sanity Code," intended to control abuses by permitting limited subsidies to college players but which actually paved the way for the "free ride" many players receive today. Watterson also explains how the growth of TV revenue led to college football programs' unprecedented prosperity, just as the rise of professional football seemed to relegate college teams to "minor league" status. He explores issues of gender and race, from the shocked reactions of spectators to the first female cheerleaders in the 1930s to their successful exploitation by Roone Arledge three decades later.
He describes the role of African-American players, from the days when Southern schools demanded all-white teams (and Northern schools meekly complied); through the black armbands and protests of the 60s; to one of the game's few successful, if limited, reforms, as black athletes dominate the playing field while often being shortchanged in the classroom. Today, Watterson observes, colleges' insatiable hunger for revenues has led to an abuse-filled game nearly indistinguishable from the professional model of the NFL. After examining the standard solutions for reform, he offers proposals of his own, including greater involvement by faculty, trustees, and college presidents. Ultimately, however, Watterson concludes that the history of college football is one in which the rules of the game have changed, but those of human nature have not.
one of the aforementioned interesting selections:
Several nice pictures:
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It is the mission of The Unbalanced Line Online Library to present important and interesting historical texts to college football fans. Items will be added regularly as blog postings and can be easily indexed in the Library button on the site bar.
Copyrighted material is used expressly under the fair use guidelines of U.S. Code 17 #107 through #118 stating that the criticism, comment, news reporting, educational use or research of copyrighted material is not held in violation of copyright laws.
_______________ © 2009 The Unbalanced Line _______________
Thursday, August 20, 2009
Looking Ahead
Scout did a interview with an optimistic Rich Ellerson
This story shows Ellerson is trying to restore Army's winning tradition.
"So there are certainly some things that are changing, and there was some good work that was being done here and we are trying to capitalize on that, and we are trying to be able to take a step forward without taking a step back... and if we can do that - and if you look at the scores from a year ago and do that - then you can say [improving the program this year] is not unrealistic."
...
"We are going to have a way of operating which is efficient and we are going to ultimately be efficient with our cadets and their time, because the cadets’ time is under such pressure."
And in this one we find out that Rutgers has ducked a six-game Notre Dame/Meadowlands agreement to play Army
The issue RU had with the ND deal was that by playing at the Meadowlands Rutgers technically lost a home game at the refurbished Rutgers Stadium. Against Army Rutgers will play as the away team, preserving another home game at their embiggened stadium.
Say what you will about RU ducking Notre Dame to play teams that are more on Rutgers' level, the Meadowlands date is a great way for Rutgers to assert their brand and claim dominance in college football's final frontier: NYC.
Oh, yeah... about that. If Rutgers is going to take ownership of Gotham they're going to have to fight off the influence of the 'Cuse who just scheduled two Meadowlands games against Notre Dame and another Meadowlands date with USC.
Tuesday, August 18, 2009
What happens in Delaware...
Another story I'm late on, but this is one really interests me. I'd like to keep an eye on how legalized gambling in the state of Delaware will effect University of Delaware sports teams. If Delaware gets sports gambling that may force the NCAA to bar the Blue Hens from postseason play in Dover.
Some guy named Randall Chase reported:
Delaware officials say professional sports leagues and the NCAA may be pushing for a quick court ruling on the state's sports betting plan because they don't want their own ties to gambling known.
Court battle aside, if gambling in the First State goes through count on the NCAA to ban Delaware as a postseason venue for all sports. Considering the Colonial Athletic Association's reputation for placing teams in the FCS playoffs a postseason ban absolutely will affect the Blue Hens. How will they react to the prospect of playing their home playoff games in Baltimore or Philadelphia? Might this spur Delaware to consider making a move to to the Big East?
I'm really interested in how this will play out, so count on updates here.
Disco Fever
At Pitt, they have begun the annual grumbling for a return to the script Pitt logo also known as Fan Fest. Pitt AD Steve Pederson has already shot down the idea of retro uniforms.
"I felt there had been enough changes,"
"I understand people like some things from years ago, but we're trying to recruit 15-, 16-, 17-, 18-year-olds, and we've built a pretty good brand with our success with what we're doing, so I don't think now is the time to change much."
The block logo is historical, it's recognizable and it actually looks like it represents a top university.classic
Getting to Know You
I missed a chance to introduce Army's captains a while back.
Senior WR Ali Villanueva, senior DT Victory Ugenyi and junior LB Stephen Anderson have been selected by their teammates as Army Football’s team captains for the 2009 season.
That article also details a few Army football ticket packages, and the price per seat is notably affordable.
Individual game tickets for the Duke, Ball State, Vanderbilt, and VMI contests can be purchased for just $29 per seat. The Tulane game, designated as the Black Knights annual Homecoming contest, is priced at $36 per ticket. In addition, fans can purchase a Rutgers ticket package for $49 per seat. This two-pack includes a ticket to the game versus the Scarlet Knights plus the customers’ choice of a ticket to either the Duke or VMI contests.
Whiskey over at One Foot Down posted his Army and Navy 2009 Preview .
Seattle Post Intelligencer's Mike Castiglion has another Army Preview.
Also, CFN/Scout.com posted a thorough Army preview way back in Feb.
NY Times The Quad has an other old Army preview here. I'm amazed that last one only came out as recently as May since Army is ranked there as #117.
I'll try to update my site links a little bit later.
Monday, August 17, 2009
What Time is It?
West Point begins classes today and the football team had their first scrimmage on Saturday. If you ask head coach Rich Ellerson, the overall theme was consistency:
"Defensively, that first group up front is very quick, very aggressive,"Ellerson praised. “Even with tired legs, even not being 100 percent, they can still come across the line of scrimmage at you. Offensively, we’ve got guys that started doing things in the spring for the first time and every time up they’re a little bit better, they’re a little more consistent. They’re experiencing everything for the first time. You’ll see positives, but you’ll also see that lack of consistency."
"For us offensively, we will not be consistent until our offensive line is consistent. That doesn’t mean they have to knock somebody on their back every snap, it means they have to be going in the right direction at the right pad level, trying to do the right thing. Then you gain some margin for error. That’s the kind of attack and react mentality that the offensive line has to have. They’re gaining that. If it’s like the rest of spring ball, they’re a little bit better than they were yesterday."
As the Black Knghts begin the 2009 season their daily class/practice schedule becomes, well, consistent.
With classes set to begin at West Point on Monday, the Black Knights will roll into their normal practice slot next week, starting on Tuesday. Practices are scheduled to run from approximately 3:30 p.m. to approximately 6 p.m.
I'll provide more Army updates as the season moves forward.
