Ode to Pre-War Football Cardboard

[revmoran]

There is an interesting article on this highlighting the role of Pop Warner and Carlisle on the Smithsonian website

For the 1907 season, Warner created a new offense dubbed “the Carlisle formation,” an early evolution of the single wing. A player could run, pass or kick without the defense divining intent from the formation. The forward pass was just the kind of “trick” the old stalwarts avoided but Warner loved, and one he soon found his players loved as well. “Once they started practicing it, Warner pretty much couldn’t stop them,” says Sally Jenkins, author of The Real All Americans, a book about Carlisle’s football legacy. “How the Indians did take to it!” Warner remembered, according to Jenkins’ book. “Light on their feet as professional dancers, and every one amazingly skillful with his hands, the redskins pirouetted in and out until the receiver was well down the field, and then they shot the ball like a bullet.”

Carlisle opened the 1907 season with a 40-0 triumph over Lebanon Valley, then ran off five more victories by a total score of 148-11 before traveling to the University of Pennsylvania’s Franklin Field (still used today) to meet undefeated and un-scored upon Pennsylvania before 22,800 fans in Philadelphia.

On the second play of the game, Carlisle’s Pete Hauser, who lined up at fullback, launched a long pass that William Gardner caught on the dead run and carried short of the goal, setting up the game’s first touchdown. The Indians completed 8 of 16 passes, including one thrown by a player relatively new to the varsity squad named Jim Thorpe. The sub-headline to the New York Times account of the game read: “Forward Pass, Perfectly Employed, Used for Ground Gaining More Than Any Other Style of Play.” The story reported that “forward passes, end runs behind compact interference from direct passes, delayed passes and punting were the Indians’ principal offensive tactics.”