The NCAA News - News and Features

The NCAA News -- November 8, 1999

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

'Its object shall be regulation and supervision'

NCAA born from need to bridge football and higher education

BY KAY HAWES
STAFF WRITER

Without much fanfare or passing of cigars, the NCAA was born on March 31, 1906. Known then as the Intercollegiate Athletic Association of the United States, the fledgling organization was small and fairly weak, but it had unlimited potential.

The NCAA's father was football and its mother was higher education. This almost unintentional union, brought on in part with intervention from the President of the United States, forever changed both amateur sports and higher education, although that outcome wasn't obvious until the youngster came of age, many years later.

The Association would struggle throughout its youth, continuing to grow and working to establish an identity that would be shaped by its many parts -- its member institutions. From 1906 to 1939, the Association grew in membership, in services to its members and in purpose as it matured, developed and began to resemble the NCAA of today.

Football -- the father of the NCAA

Without the sport of football there would be no NCAA, at least not as we know it today. Football was the initial reason for the Association, although the organization didn't limit itself, even from the beginning, to just one sport. But football was the seed that began it all.

Historians place the birth of football as far back as perhaps the time of Julius Caesar, but those games probably didn't resemble what we now think of as football at all. Several different countries and cultures -- from the Romans to the Celts to the Aztecs -- claim a piece of the origin of the game.

However, the name "football," the use of a pigskin, the kicking a ball across a particular line and the orchestrated violence of the game can all be traced to England and Scotland. Kings of both countries denounced the game for its violence and its tendency to distract young men from archery, riding and other warlike pursuits necessary for the training of soldiers. But no one could deny the game's growing popularity, and it moved from a rural pursuit to an organized one conducted in city streets and at institutions of higher learning.

A form of football that the modern fan would recognize emerged from the fine preparatory schools of England, but it still resembled both soccer and rugby. One day in 1823, a schoolboy named William Webb Ellis grabbed the ball and ran with it. From that point forward, rugby and soccer went different directions, with rugby providing the foundation for football. However, for much of the 1800s, football was played by whatever rules both teams agreed upon. Depending on who was playing, it might resemble soccer or it might be more like rugby.

Then in 1876, students from Princeton, Harvard, Yale and Columbia Universities met to establish a uniform code of rules. The rules as adopted reflected Harvard's leanings toward a more rugby-like game, where the ball could be picked up and advanced by carrying.

'One human life is too big a price'

As more schools picked up the game and the rules developed over time, football became a body-slinging battle that often resulted in severe injuries. There was no forward pass, no neutral zone between teams and no limit to how few players could be on the line at once.

"Hurdle plays" were permitted, allowing teams to literally pick up and launch their ball carrier over the opposing line. Mass-momentum plays, whereby the runner is protected by a moving "V" or a "flying wedge" of players, gained popularity as a way to advance the ball, but they also increased the game's violence as linemen were permitted to do almost anything to run over the opposition.

There were no helmets, mouthpieces or face guards, and the few primitive pads that existed were of little benefit to the athlete.

As football's critics got louder, it was obvious that there was need for reform. State legislatures debated making it illegal and several colleges and universities banned the sport, but the loosely formed national football rules committee only offered up a few changes to the game.

"To make matters worse," wrote football historian Col. A. M. Weyland, "there was no authoritative body that could take the necessary action."

The 1905 college football season produced 18 deaths and 149 serious injuries, leading those in higher education to question the game's place on their campuses.

"One human life is too big a price for all the games of the season," said James Roscoe Day, chancellor of Syracuse University.

The game might have died that year had it not been for the nation's chief executive officer, President Theodore Roosevelt, a Harvard man, football fan and former student-athlete. On October 9, 1905, before the bloody season had even finished, Roosevelt called representatives of Harvard, Yale and Princeton to the White House to discuss the game's future. Roosevelt was clear: Reform the game or it will be outlawed, perhaps even by an Executive Order of the President himself.

After hearing of the President's concerns, the existing rules committee made some changes to the game, but there was still no national athletics organization with the power to force the committee to completely reform football.

Then Henry M. MacCracken, the chancellor of New York University, took it upon himself to call a meeting of football-playing institutions of higher education. Thirteen attended that first meeting in New York City on December 9, 1905, and the schools decided to reform the game and meet again, on December 28. At that meeting, 62 schools are represented.

Capt. Palmer E. Pierce of the U.S. Military Academy suggested creating a formal association, the National Intercollegiate Football Conference. Representatives from the other schools agreed with the idea, but decided to leave out the word "football," thus creating the Intercollegiate Athletic Association of the United States (IAAUS).

The delegates also created a new IAAUS football rules committee and invited the old football rules committee to participate, which they eventually agreed to do. What was known as the "amalgamated" committee made many changes to the game, including approving the forward pass, prohibiting hurdling and mass-momentum plays (by requiring at least six men on the offensive line), and increasing first-down yardage to 10 yards. The game was saved, and by the issuing of a formal constitution and bylaws on March 31, 1906, the Association -- still the IAAUS for another four years -- was created.

Taking control of college sports

At the first Convention of the IAAUS, held December 29, 1906, much of the business dealt with forming the new Association. The constitution and bylaws drawn up in March had been ratified by 35 institutions, and the second article of the constitution spelled out the Association's purpose: "Its object shall be the regulation and supervision of college athletics throughout the United States, in order that the athletic activities ... may be maintained on an ethical plane in keeping with the dignity and high purpose of education."

The members of the fledgling Association also agreed to a concept known as home rule, whereby each institution was responsible for policing itself. States article eight, "The Colleges and Universities enrolled in this Association severally agree to take control of student athletic sports, as far as may be necessary, to maintain in them a high standard of personal honor, eligibility and fair play, and to remedy whatever abuses may exist."

The young Association was in no position to police athletics for its members, a fact that Pierce, the Association's first president, acknowledged at the Convention. "Definite rules of eligibility made mandatory upon all members of the Association were judged impractical at the present time, by reason of the widely diverse conditions prevailing in different parts of the country," he reported.

The Association was divided into six districts, and representatives from each district reported on athletics issues in their region. The reports included issues that persist in the Association now, nearly 100 years later: freshman eligibility for varsity teams; academic eligibility for both new and continuing student-athletes; codes of ethics and improvement of sportsmanship; residency requirements; preseason training rules; training-table rules; contest limitations; the involvement of faculty in athletics; scholarship standards, including a 12-hour rule; amateurism and agents, especially as related to baseball; officiating; and record-keeping for statistical purposes.

For the next several years the Association concerned itself with the problems of just a few sports -- football, basketball, track and field, and baseball -- while it also continued to struggle with issues of amateurism and eligibility.

One of the Association's largest problems was growth. Pierce believed that to survive, the Association must have the support of Harvard, Yale, Princeton, Cornell University and the U.S. Naval Academy.

Eventually, they all joined. By 1909, the Association had 67 member institutions, and in 1910, it renamed itself the National Collegiate Athletic Association to reflect its now truly national nature.

A time of debate and change

For the first several years of the NCAA's existence, the issues that surfaced at the first Convention continued to cause much debate. Several New England colleges declined to join the Association because they did not prohibit what was known as summer baseball, an activity that conflicted with the Association's stance on amateurism.

The playing rules for basketball and track and field were under the purview of a number of different committees, and eventually the Association took control of the rules, much as it did in football, by working with old rules committees until its own committees were powerful enough to stand alone.

In 1909 football faced another challenge, as 33 players were killed. This time the Association's football rules committee was clearly in charge, and the changes were drastic and quick.

While additional changes continued to be made over the years, never again was the sport in danger of being abolished.

When Congress declared war on Germany in 1917, intercollegiate athletics took a back seat to military preparedness and service.

Most institutions saw their enrollments fall sharply as men enlisted in the military, and many schools suspended varsity athletics for a time, putting military training courses in their place.

While the war temporarily restrained the growth of athletics, not everyone was judged fit enough for service. Athletics then were suggested to improve the fitness of all students, and mandatory physical education entered the picture.

When the war was over, athletics enjoyed a boom time. By 1919, there were 170 institutions in the NCAA, and the Association was directly involved in 11 sports.

With this increase in athletics' popularity came increases in excesses, including extravagant training tables, the lax enforcement of amateurism rules, and an increased emphasis on scouting and recruiting.

The Association recognized the abuses -- including the extensive recruiting and subsidizing of student-athletes -- but the policing of such activities, while clearly in violation of stated Association goals and policies, was left to the institutions and later the conferences.

It was not until 1940 that the membership authorized the NCAA Executive Committee to investigate alleged violations of the NCAA's amateurism regulations and to issue interpretations of the Association's constitution.

Thus began a new chapter in the Association's history.

Part II of the NCAA Century Series will examine the Association from 1940-79.