iversity because they do not drain on the univer sity’s educational money.' The Athletic Department is (at least at Penn State) a self-supporting operation; it makes money. And if we assume that the existence of all other varsity teams at Penn State is justifiable, then the football program benefits the university by financing all their operations. However, the financially autogenous structure of the Athletic Department is not by itself .reasonable justification for its continued operation. But as the football team is winning big, the surplus money generated by bowl windfalls and television contracts is channeled into' improving the intramural facilities for the students, building new tennis courts, and upgrading the available facilities in general.' This is a distinct, measurable benefit of the program. Another measurable plus for big-time football is the interest in the University it keeps alive in the alumni. This means money; for the Athletic Department (Levi Lamb Fund); and, more importantly to this examination, for the university’s growth (Alumni Fund). Football keeps the alumni active with their alma mater. As one alumnus stated, “If I was a geology graduate, why would I ever come back except for football? To visit my fa vorite rocks?” As far as football’s assets to the average student, the arguments divide-sharply. Penn State students started the sport, but every year the Athletic Department recruits the high school graduates that it wants to play it. So apart is the program from the university that students who only wish to watch practice are ordered to leave. At the'state.-funded Pennsylvania State University last spring, 19 of 27 recruits didn’t even' attend high school in Penn sylvania. However, education at Penn State, to be sure, is not offered exclu sively to Pennsylvanians. Even when the students are allowed to watch the team, they receive the worst seats in Beaver Stadium. Money may not be all important in the football program, but it does seem that Rec Hall caters much better to spectators bearing $7.50 than to its most vocal supporters, the students. As mentioned above, the program does fund athletic improvements exclusively for the students. It also provides socially important functions. ■ ;|h- 1 __ . It used to belong to the students • The first Penn State intercollegiate football contest was Nov. 12, 1881. The students first issued a challenge to Bucknell, it was accepted, and on the afternoon of Nov. 11 the team left State College in two horse drawn rigs. The carriages were left at a livery in Spring Mills where the team caught the train to Lewisburg. On the next afternoon, in a drizzling rain, Penn State won 9-0. Intercollegiate football at Penn State has seen four major eras since students of the Pennsylvania State College organized the sport in the 1880’s. But it wash’t until 1887 that the students had their athletic association organized well enough to field a team that owned a schedule. At its beginning, students handled every aspect of the football program, even the coaching. Students comprised the athletic association in its entirety. They eiven made the schedules and chose the starting teams. In the years following the students tried to improve and expand the program, but, lacking funds, they eventually turned to the alumni. . The era of alumni control began in 1908 the students reorganized their association and transferred the authority for the business and management affairs to the alumni. Under the alumni the program moved into the “Golden Era,” the period immediately following the First Among new aquaintances, over a few beers in the evening, talk usually includes football. There can be no denying that students in the public mind is one of the important genuinely love college football. They love expressions of the College’s activities, and to read about it, talk about it and watch it. this is particularly true of football. Ex- More than simply entertainment, the' cellence in competition is expected: by team . adds an additional element to Alumni as an evidence of the good spirit campus in the fall which makes that term and adequate physical training of ;the seem best. It’s not school spirit it’s student body, in fact, as a reflection of one impossible to love an institution like Penn of the accomplishments of the College. State. Perhaps it’s a feeling of in- Teams need not win every time, but they volvement and union with the entire must win a reasonable number of times in student body and alumni. The heart of the a given period if the Alumni and public are university is in Beaver Stadium on home to believe" in' the soundness of this game afternoons. It’s a valuable feeling, partiqylar phase of College activity.” Even though the football program But even if the Alumni committee in touches only a very small number of 1935 failed to report them, there are strong students, it must still answer one fun- arguments that correlate intellectual damental question to justify its presence development and athletics, in the university community: Does Dr. Paul Weiss, Sterling Professor of contribute to the intellectual growth of its“ Philosophy at Yale University, writes in participants? n , favor of sports: Again the answers separate. . j “No one seems to have discovered a As viewed by the alumni after establish- {better way for producing fine adults than ment of the College of Physical Education, by making young men learn how to make college football was to be a showpiece for creative use of rules which demand self the university, with the actual benefits to discipline, thoughtfulness, and the participants secondary considerations cooperation. Such rules govern athletic at best. In 1935, the Special Alumni events...lt is sometimes contended that Committee on Athletics reported the athletics not only builds bodies but following need for college football: character. The Daily Collegian Fall Sports Preview Friday, September 13, 1974 World War. During the period from 1921 to 1929, the team repeatedly generated surplus revenue in access of $25,000. These were also the years Penn State made two trips to the West Coast, beating Washington 21-7 in Seattle in 1921, and losing to Southern California 14-3 in the 1923 Rose Bowl. But late in the decade, amid mounting criticism from t ,the in tellectual community, the rapid growth of football at Penn State was halted. Specifically, there were two evils singled out; subsidizing (awarding scholarships); and proselyting (recruiting). Penn State began its curtailment of big-time athletics evefi before the famous Carnegie Foun dation report on college athletics was published in 1929, which documented abuses and-irregularities in college athletic programs. In 1926 the Alumni Athletic Board sliced scholarships from 75 to 50. The following year the board ended this subsidizing program completely. That started a period of de-emphasis that lasted well into the 1930’5. During this time, scouting was forbidden, spring practice was voluntary, and scholarships were not awarded. At this time the alumni also recommended that the Department of Physical Education be separated from the coaching of intercollegiate athletics. “The School of Physical Education and Athletics has a most potent influence on Alumni attitude...lntercollegiate athletics .JP&r. Thus in January, 1930, the Board of Trustees approved and established the new college. The “Alumni News” of Feb:, 1930, recorded the fact with the following note: i “All members of the School ofi Physical Education and the Athletics staff, including present and future coaches, are to be employed as regular membelrs of thej academic staff of the College, and are to be responsible to the college administration in the same manner as are faculty members of the six other schools of the College.” Slowly, the attitudes on football relaxed, the de-emphasis of football was itself de-emphasized, .and after toiling through ithe ’3o’s, Penn State experienced its 'East losing season in 1938. The new era, the winning, , streamlined, professionalized era, is y the one-that somes up to the present. The whole tiling started with an unorganized group of students, who probably learned a lot running such a disorganized program with problems (the Columbia game inM93 ended in dispute when spectators ran onto the field and helped Columbia push over the final touchdown.) Of ficiating was very bad and eligibility rules nonexistent. But it all belonged to the students at Penn State, back in the 1880’s and 90’s. —Rick Starr “Character, it has long been known, is best forged by making men face crises in the little; by being pushed up against limits they define themselves. If they are made to‘do this again and again in the same areas, firm habits are established, enabling the men to act without much reflection and yet with surety and precisian. “Properly trained, the men gradually learn how to act quickly and yet suc cessfully; properly aimed, their actions will be productive of what enriches while it satisfies. -As a result of their athletic activity the men will become more alert to the insistence and rights of others, both those with whom they play and those against whom they play. “If athletic training will lead to such outcomes as these more expeditiously than other means allow, it will provide a strong justification for sport programs’.” In the final analysis, any realistic conclusion must support the continuance of professionalized collegiate athletics, at least temporarily. But this does not mean all is well. ; ’ Although little has been said up to this point about scholarship abuses, recruiting abuses, 'the influence of athletic depaijt (continued on page 10)
Significant historical Pennsylvania newspapers