Posted on 12/22/2021 7:36:37 AM PST by Kaslin
A massive crowd swarmed City Hall Park and the streets around it on the afternoon of Oct. 28, 1922.
The New York Police had been warned it was coming and diverted traffic as a safety measure.
Was the crowd there to protest? No. It was there to cheer on a college football game -- one that was about to kick off hundreds of miles away in Chicago at a place called Stagg Field, which could seat only 32,000 fans. The undefeated University of Chicago Maroons (coached by the famous Amos Alonzo Stagg) were about to face off against the undefeated Princeton Tigers.
A bigger problem for both local and federal law enforcement -- as evidenced by news reports that week -- was making sure that the laws involving ticket scalping and theft were effectively enforced.
"Chicago is football crazy," said a report in the New York Herald. "It seems a shame that so few spectators can be seated at the Chicago field. It is no exaggeration to say that 200,000 persons might have witnessed this game if there had been room to pack them in."
"The police were also notified that 500 registered letters containing tickets for the Princeton-Chicago football game tomorrow had been stolen," the paper reported.
"Such tickets as fell into the hands of the speculators brought many times their face value," said the paper.
"One hundred dollars a ticket is the prevailing price today," it said.
hat equals $1,656 in October 2021 dollars.
"My idea of the Height of Affluence," a reader commented in the Chicago Tribune, "is possessing a ticket to the Chicago-Princeton football game."
The Herald noted a federal interest in the ticket scalping.
"With the last seat to the Chicago-Princeton game sold over a week ago and thousands of disappointed fans trying to find a way to gain admittance to the gridiron classic, government agents today renewed their drive against ticket scalpers," said this report.
"Twelve John Doe warrants were issued by United States Commissioner Mason in connection with the sale of unstamped tickets to the game by speculators," it said. "The laws require that excess prices for tickets be stamped on the back, the government collecting half the excess."
So why did a crowd gather outside New York's City Hall in 1922 to cheer on a football game being played in Chicago? The Brooklyn Standard Union and the New York Tribune published stories that explained it.
"The Chicago-Princeton football game, to be played in Chicago Saturday, Oct. 28, will be broadcasted from radio station WEAF in New York, by direct communication to a 900-mile telephone circuit running from Stagg Field to WEAF," said the Standard Union. "This is the first time in the history of radio that a long distance telephone circuit will be directly connected to a broadcast station."
The Tribune itself played a key role in what transpired.
"Thousands of football fans packed Park Row and City Hall Park yesterday afternoon to hear the play by play account of the game between Princeton and Chicago," reported the Tribune.
"In order to make possible this epochal event in the history of radio, half a transcontinental telephone system was connected up to WEAF by the engineers of the American Telephone and Telegraph Company, and more than a million persons throughout the East were able to listen to the progress of the intersectional battle," said the paper.
"At 1 o'clock yesterday afternoon the big white motor truck containing the mobile public address system developed by the engineers of the Western Electric Company was drawn up in front of the Tribune Building and connected by wires to the loud speakers erected on the third floor of the building."
"The volume of sound thus produced was sufficient to reach every one in the square, and even those standing on Broadway were able to hear each syllable clearly and distinctly," said the paper.
"The great crowd in Park Row contained many rooters for each team, who joined their cheers to those which were broadcast and who remained until well after dark to get the final result of the dramatic game," the Tribune reported.
And it was dramatic.
Going into the fourth quarter, Chicago led 18 to 7. But then Chicago running back John Thomas fumbled at Chicago's 35 and Princeton's Howdy Gray scooped up the ball and ran for a touchdown. Princeton successfully kicked the extra point (which Chicago had failed to do three times) and the score was 18 to 14. Princeton then forced Chicago to punt, drove for another touchdown -- and, again, made the extra point.
Princeton now led 21 to 18.
A few minutes later, as reported by the South Bend News-Times, Chicago had first and goal-to-go at Princeton's six. They ran for two yards, then three, then one foot, then none.
Princeton won the game.
Back at City Hall Park, the crowd listening to the radio broadcast had been riveted by these final moments.
"Toward the end of the game, with Princeton leading, 21 to 18, and the ball in Chicago's possession, inches from the Princeton goal line, the crowd could not have been more tense had they been at the actual game," said the Tribune.
When it was over, "Tiger supporters so far forgot themselves in their wild excitement that a number of them started a snake dance."
The first football games ever broadcast locally on radio were at the University of Minnesota. "In 1912, Professor F.W. Springer and a young instructor, H.M. Turner, began an experimental radio station with the call numbers 9X1-WLB," historian Ronald A. Smith wrote in his book "Play-by-Play: Radio, Television, and Big-Time College Sport."
"As part of their investigation," Smith wrote, "Springer and Turner broadcast accounts of Minnesota's home football games to a sparse audience."
The 1920 Texas A&M-Texas game was also broadcasted locally.
"The 1922 Princeton-Chicago game was, though, a breakthrough for college broadcasting," Smith concluded.
"With the beginning of the 1922 Princeton-Chicago game," he wrote, "radio had made itself an integral part of the nationalization of football, by making interregional competition immediately available to masses through the airwaves."
Television, of course, would later join radio in broadcasting college football and in the 2019 regular season, according to the National Football Foundation, 392 games were televised. They "averaged 1,839,000 viewers per game ... while reaching more than 145 million unique fans."
When college football games are played on Jan. 1, 2022, America can celebrate 100 years of football broadcasts.
It is one of this nation's great traditions.
If I recall correctly, radio broadcasting as we know it today, started with AM radio stations in 1920. It sounds like they quickly got the idea to broadcast sports events on radio.
I’m sure that some color commentator on radio had already said “their offense really needs to put more points on the board” or “their defense needs to make some stops” by then. We take the bad with the good.
I thought the nfl was dead. They are to me.
The NFL also started on October 3, 1920.
There maybe a breakthrough. Last night the paid talking heads finally admitted that the league sucks. It’s a shame what they did to that league. It’s as if a clone of Deion Sanders was playing every position. Sad and unwatchable!
My question is, were both teams actually giving 110%? Or was one team upping the ante and giving an unheard of 111%?
You take the good
You take the bad
You take them both and there you have the facts of life
The facts of life
There’s a time you got to go
And show you’re growin’
Now you know about the facts of life
The facts of life
When the world never seems
To be living up to your dreams
Then suddenly you’re finding out
The facts of life are all about you, you
When there’s someone that you care about
It really isn’t fair, they’re out to slow you up
When you’re growing up
When you let them flirt and then you hurt waiting
‘Cause your date is late in showing up
Then you’re growin’ up
When it’s more than just the birds and the bees
You need someone telling you please
There’s only one conclusion
There will always be confusion over you, you, you
It takes a lot to get all ‘em right
When you’re learning them all facts of life
You’ll avoid a lot of damage
And enjoy the fun of managing the facts of life
They shed a lot of light
If you hear ‘em from your brother
Better clear ‘em with your mother
Better get ‘em right
Call her late at night
You got the future in the palm of your hand
Now all you gotta do to get you through is understand
You think you’d rather do without
You’ll never muddle through without the truth
The facts of life are all about you
Learn all the fact of life
All about you, you, you
They’re all about you
Oh, things about the facts of life
You’re never gonna learn them in just one night
Oh, things about facts of life
Oh, they’re all about you
Oh, things about facts of life
You’re never gonna learn them in just one night
Oh, things about facts of life
They’re all about you, all about you
Which would be worse: 100 years of football or a 100 years of Dr. Zhivago?
Unfortunately, U of C killed its football program and only brought it back in DIV-III form. No one followed it on campus when I attended there.
Interesting note: The Chicago Maroons provided the football jerseys for a charter member in the fledgling league that would become the NFL. The Chicago Maroons provided its faded shirts to the Chicago team that would name itself the Chicago Cardinals, after the faded color of those jerseys.
+1 😉
And those Chicago Cardinals eventually moved to St.Louis, and then to Arizona.
Back in the 1940s, one of the top radio play-by-play men was Clem McCarthy. Knowing there was no tv broadcasts most of the time, McCarthy had a little trick that if Smith was breaking off a long run, and he realized it was actually Johnson, McCarthy would invent Smith lateraling the ball to Johnson who would then cross the goal line for the touchdown.
Then came the 1947 Kentucky Derby where fans climbed on top of the starter’s gate as the horses rounded the final turn into the home stretch, so the track announcer didn’t see that the horse named Jet Pilot had overtaken the horse named Faultless. The track announcer called the wrong horse as the winner to millions of racing fans across the country who had no other way to verify the results. He corrected himself minutes later but the gaffe became radio history.
McCarthy was the host of the broadcast and tried as best he could to excuse the track announcer for his mistake. This led one sportswriter to say “His only problem is that you can’t lateral a horse”.
Interesting history. Princeton played in the first college football game in 1869. I played in the 100th anniversary of that game, Princeton losing to Rutgers 29-0.
Watching the Eagles/Redskins last night, that Mark Sanchez really is as bad an announcer as he was a quarterback.
I miss Keith Jackson. Whoa Nelly!
Some side trivia
The Tribune itself played a key role in what transpired.
. . . the Tribune Building and connected by wires to the loud speakers erected on the third floor of the building.”
My alma mater acquired the property to build it flagship building of the downtown campus.
The Tribune Building served as the Tribune’s headquarters until 1922, but also housed office tenants, as well as the early classrooms of Pace University. It was demolished in 1966 to make room for Pace’s, 1 Pace Plaza building, and few remnants of the Tribune Building exist.
Pace also bought and still owns the New York Times Building, also known as 41 Park Row and 147 Nassau Street which is on the corner of Park Row and Spruce Street. Pace also owned the building at the corner of Spruce and Nassau streets where I remember watching city hall events.
Well,,,at least they don’t let him play!
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