Shot in the then-brand-new Yale Bowl in 1914, this rare, silent film shows highlights of the Harvard-Yale football game and features shots of the notable personalities involved. This includes Walter Camp (:29) the “Father of American Football”, first year Yale head coach Hinkey (:41), Yale team captain Bud Talbot (:54), Massachusetts Governor Walsh (1:03), Harvard team captain Charlie Brickley (1:18), The game played on November 21 was the inaugural event at the Yale Bowl. William Howard Taft and Theodore Roosevelt were among the spectators, a throng estimated at more than 70,000 but less than 74,000. Harvard won the day, 36–0. The day’s memorable play was a 75-yard touchdown run after a recovered fumble by Jeff Coolidge. Coolidge gathered the Yale fumble with Harvard leading by two touchdowns (see 2:55). “Yale has the Bowl but Harvard has the punch” was reportedly repeated often in the press the next day. The Bulldogs finished with a 7–2 record under Hinkey. The Crimson finished with an undefeated 7–0–2 record under seventh-year head coach Percy Haughton, with the two ties coming at the hands of Brown and Penn State. Charles Brickely ended up as a football coach in college and for a pro team that was a predecessor of the New York Giants. It’s not clear what became of Bud Talbot.
Designs for the Rose Bowl and Michigan Stadium were influenced by the Yale Bowl Stadium, 276 Derby Avenue, West Haven, CT. When the Bowl was built by developer Charles Ferry, the Colosseum of Pompeii in Italy was the only other known structure in the world engineered by digging a hole then using the displaced dirt to build the surrounding wall or berm. The Bowl had the largest seating capacity for a stadium in the world upon completion of construction. Head coach Carm Cozza likened the feeling of running through the tunnel then onto the Bowl’s to a gladiator entering the arena.
The Yale Bowl, completed before World World I, presaged a collegiate stadium-building blitz associated with the game’s popularity in the Roaring Twenties. The modern era of college football, with radio broadcasts coast to coast of gridiron exploits by Red Grange or the Four Horsemen of Notre Dame, began soon after the construction of stadiums that rivaled the Yale Bowl’s seating capacity. The Rose Bowl venue, its annual post-season contest, and the plethora of venues and post-season football contests known as “bowls” has been attributed to the Yale Bowl.
Walter Chauncey Camp (April 7, 1859 – March 14, 1925) was an American football player, coach, and sports writer known as the “Father of American Football”. Among a long list of inventions, he created the sport’s line of scrimmage and the system of downs. With John Heisman, Amos Alonzo Stagg, Pop Warner, Fielding H. Yost, and George Halas, Camp was one of the most accomplished persons in the early history of American football. He attended Yale College, where he played and coached college football. Camp’s Yale teams of 1888, 1891, and 1892 have been recognized as national champions. Camp was inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame as a coach during 1951.
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This film is part of the Periscope Film LLC archive, one of the largest historic military, transportation, and aviation stock footage collections in the USA. Entirely film backed, this material is available for licensing in 24p HD, 2k and 4k. For more information visit http://www.PeriscopeFilm.com
