The NCAA News - News and Features

The NCAA News -- November 8, 1999

The NCAA Century Series -- Part I: 1900-39

Roosevelt's love of sports led to NCAA's birth

President stepped in to save football and assemble first athletics administration

BY KAY HAWES
STAFF WRITER

Theodore Roosevelt Jr., the nation's 26th President, is a figure in history remembered for many different reasons, from the origin of the "Teddy" bear to the Rough Riders' capture of San Juan Hill, the acquisition and construction of the Panama Canal, and his well-known military strategy: "Speak softly and carry a big stick."

Roosevelt also should be remembered for his part in not only the creation of what was to become the NCAA, but also for his part in the salvation of football and, ultimately, his positive influence in all of intercollegiate athletics.

Born in 1858, Roosevelt had a privileged youth, having grown up in a family whose fortune was already established in New York. But he was sickly as a child, suffering from a variety of ailments, the worst of which was a severe case of asthma.

At the time, there were no known medicines for asthma, and his parents tried the remedies of the time, nicotine and caffeine, with little success. At times, Roosevelt was so weak his father had to carry him from place to place.

When Roosevelt was 10, his family journeyed to Europe, where young Roosevelt spent time hiking in the mountains with his father. To the family's surprise, the exercise helped the asthma. It was then that the elder Roosevelt, Theodore Sr., is said to have told his son, "Theodore, you have the mind, but you have not the body, and without help of the body the mind cannot go as far as it should. You must make your body. It is hard drudgery to make one's body, but I know you will do it."

From that time forward, young Roosevelt followed a strict regimen of exercise every day. A room in the Roosevelt home was remodeled to accommodate his equipment, and he lifted weights, did gymnastics and participated in horseback riding, skating, climbing, hiking, rowing and swimming, along with any other form of exercise that presented itself.

When Roosevelt was 13, he was finally fitted with glasses, drastically improving his coordination and reducing his awkwardness, which was largely caused by the fact that he simply couldn't see where he was going.

The next year, on a train ride intended to take him to a wilderness area where he could better recover from an asthma attack, he was accosted by bullies. He realized then that in spite of his efforts to be fit, he could not protect himself. He promptly doubled his efforts and learned to box.

A few years later, Roosevelt, then a student at Harvard University, found himself boxing for the lightweight championship of the Harvard Athletic Association. It was then that he proved himself a good sport as well as an athlete.

The other young man, defending champion C.S. Hanks, landed a heavy punch to Roosevelt's nose after time had been called. With blood gushing from his nose, Roosevelt told the official and the booing crowd, "It's all right, he didn't hear him," as he pointed to the timekeeper. Roosevelt shook hands with Hanks and the match continued. It also was clear that Roosevelt was outmatched, but he continued to fight, proving himself a determined competitor.

Times of war, times of peace

Roosevelt graduated from Harvard, went to Columbia Law School and eventually served in the New York State Assembly and as governor of New York.

He also kept to his adventurous ways, climbing the Matterhorn and running a ranch out West. He wrote books and was a student of military history as well as an avid horseman, hunter and naturalist. An early advocate of environmental conservation, Roosevelt led expeditions to South America and Africa for prominent U.S. museums.

His true calling was in politics, however, and he eventually returned to New York to enter political life. He married his childhood sweetheart (several years after his first wife died of typhoid fever), and he worked in public service before his appointment as assistant secretary of the Navy.

In the United States' war with Spain, Roosevelt won national fame for his role leading an all-volunteer regiment of the cavalry known as the Rough Riders. When he returned from battle, his popularity helped him gain a Republican nomination and ultimately the governor's seat in New York.

Only two years later, in 1900, he was nominated to be vice-president of the United States on the William McKinley ticket. On September 14, 1901, McKinley died from a wound inflicted by an assassin and Roosevelt became president, serving the rest of McKinley's term and winning one in his own right. When he went to inspect the construction of the Panama Canal, a project he strongly supported, he became the first American president to leave American soil. He also became the first American to win a Nobel Peace Prize, earning his in 1906 for his part in a treaty between Russia and Japan.

The value of sport

In Roosevelt's mind, the ability to defend yourself, both personally and as a nation, was linked to fitness. He encouraged his six children just as his father had encouraged him.

"We were all taught out-of-door life," wrote Roosevelt's oldest son, also named Theodore. "We spent our days riding and shooting, wandering through the woods and playing out-of-door games. Underlying all this was father's desire to have all of us children grow up manly and clean-minded, with not only the desire but the ability to play our part at the country's need.

"At school and at college, father encouraged us to take part in the games and sports. None of us was really a good athlete -- father himself was not -- but we put into it all we had. He was just as much interested in hearing what we had done on the second football team or class crew as if we had been varsity stars."

In 1905, Roosevelt's opinions on the value of sport drew him into a politically sensitive issue where few expected to find the President of the United States.

Football was rapidly gaining critics as that season when 18 young men died and 149 were injured. Previous attempts to change the rules to make the game less violent had gone nowhere. Roosevelt was a fan of football who believed, that with appropriate rules changes, the game could be preserved. On October 9, 1905, he summoned representatives from Harvard, Yale and Princeton to the White House. The topic of discussion was making football less dangerous and, ultimately, saving the sport, which the public was denouncing as being brutal and inappropriate for young men.

For the first time in 25 years, those responsible for football rules agreed to change the game. Later that same year, Henry M. MacCracken, chancellor of New York University, convened a meeting of 13 institutions to initiate changes in football rules. At a subsequent meeting December 28 in New York City, the group founded the Intercollegiate Athletic Association, which would later become the NCAA.

Roosevelt is still recognized for his love of sport and his role in the founding of the NCAA. The Association's highest award is named in his honor. Initiated in 1967, the Teddy is presented each year to a distinguished citizen of national reputation and outstanding accomplishment who was a letter-winner in college. The recipient, through personal example and continuing interest in physical fitness, must exemplify the ideals and purposes of college athletics and amateur sports.