May 1, 2014
While focusing primarily on the eventful, and at times disreputable, career and life of long forgotten 1890s University of Wisconsin football star Pat O'Dea (1872-1962), this book provides a thorough history of the early developmental years of football, from 1890 to 1915. Major rules changes, the evolution of the style of play, and further aspects such as equipment standards and practice methods are outlined; the book also depicts the growth of the game during that period in the West and the South as football expanded its influence beyond its tony Ivy League origins to become a national sport. Journalist Revsine (studio host, Big Ten Network) emphasizes how problems in the sport from that time are echoed by the challenges faced by the game today: violent injuries on the gridiron, the corrupting influence of money, and the conflict between the mission of academia and high-stakes athletic competition. Other recent books covering this era of football have concentrated on the cultural and literary facets of the formative years, making this title distinctive. VERDICT This painstakingly researched and colorfully written book will primarily appeal to devoted students of football history at all levels.--John Maxymuk, Rutgers Univ. Lib., Camden, NJ
Copyright 2014 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.
April 15, 2014
Big Ten Network lead studio host and former ESPN anchor Revsine explores how the early days of college football were a lot like the climate of the sport today. Reading the author's heavily researched tale of the history of college football--specifically, the period between 1890 and 1915--is like watching an old-fashioned, dramatic movie newsreel. Though sometimes slow moving, it is a vivid examination of the sport's infancy. Before the rise of collegiate football, strenuous physical activity was regarded as boorish and unimportant, but football quickly "took off" on college campuses in the mid-19th century, especially among Ivy League schools like Harvard, Yale and Princeton. Revsine's descriptions of momentous games and quotes from published accounts give the narrative a storybook feel. He examines how numerous issues and ethical questions during the sport's early years are still debated today, such as whether schools were sacrificing academic integrity for athletic success and monetary reward. As far back as 1894, some worried that profits earned from football were "the curse, if not indeed the downfall, of honest university sport." The $119,000 netted by that year's Harvard-Yale game (over $3 million in today's money) is presently what advertisers pay for just three commercials aired during ESPN's weekly (during the football season) College GameDay broadcast. Just as they do now, schools saw college football as a "valuable public-relations tool--a means of publicizing their university and energizing alumni, which, of course, had further financial implications." Revsine's exploration of this early period underscores how these concerns not only still exist, but are perhaps impossible to resolve with the ideal of a lucrative yet "pure" collegiate sport. An interesting demonstration of how athletics remains today what it was well over 100 years ago: big business.
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