Rutgers and Princeton
played a college soccer football game,
the first ever, November 6. The game used
modified London Football Association rules.
During the next seven years, rugby gained
favor with the major eastern schools over
soccer, and modern football began to develop
from rugby.
1876
At the Massasoit convention, the
first rules for American football were
written. Walter Camp, who would become
known as the father of American football,
first became involved with the game.
1892
In an era in which football was
a major attraction of local athletic
clubs, an intense competition between
two Pittsburgh-area clubs, the Allegheny
Athletic Association (AAA) and the Pittsburgh
Athletic Club (PAC), led to the making
of the first professional football player.
Former Yale All-America guard William
(Pudge) Heffelfinger was paid $500 by
the AAA to play in a game against the
PAC, becoming the first person to be
paid to play football, November 12.
The AAA won the game 4-0 when Heffelfinger
picked up a PAC fumble and ran 25 yards
for a touchdown.
1893
The Pittsburgh Athletic Club signed
one of its players, probably halfback
Grant Dibert, to the first known pro
football contract, which covered all
of the PAC's games for the year.
1895
John Brallier became the first football
player to openly turn pro, accepting
$10 and expenses to play for the Latrobe
YMCA against the Jeannette Athletic
Club.
1896
The Allegheny Athletic Association
team fielded the first completely professional
team for its abbreviated two-game season.
1897
The Latrobe Athletic Association
football team went entirely professional,
becoming the first team to play a full
season with only professionals.
1898
A touchdown was changed from four
points to five.
1899
Chris O'Brien formed a neighborhood
team, which played under the name the
Morgan Athletic Club, on the south side
of Chicago. The team later became known
as the Normals, then the Racine (for
a street in Chicago) Cardinals, the
Chicago Cardinals, the St. Louis Cardinals,
the Phoenix Cardinals, and, in 1994,
the Arizona Cardinals. The team remains
the oldest continuing operation in pro
football.
1900
William C. Temple took over the
team payments for the Duquesne Country
and Athletic Club, becoming the first
known individual club owner.
1902
Baseball's Philadelphia Athletics,
managed by Connie Mack, and the Philadelphia
Phillies formed professional football
teams, joining the Pittsburgh Stars
in the first attempt at a pro football
league, named the National Football
League. The Athletics won the first
night football game ever played, 39-0
over Kanaweola AC at Elmira, New York,
November 21.
All three teams claimed the pro championship
for the year, but the league president,
Dave Berry, named the Stars the champions.
Pitcher Rube Waddell was with the Athletics,
and pitcher Christy Mathewson a fullback
for Pittsburgh.
The first World Series of pro football,
actually a five-team tournament, was
played among a team made up of players
from both the Athletics and the Phillies,
but simply named New York; the New York
Knickerbockers; the Syracuse AC; the
Warlow AC; and the Orange (New Jersey)
AC at New York's original Madison Square
Garden. New York and Syracuse played
the first indoor football game before
3,000, December 28. Syracuse, with Glen
(Pop) Warner at guard, won 6-0 and went
on to win the tournament.
1903
The Franklin (Pa.) Athletic Club
won the second and last World Series
of pro football over the Oreos AC of
Asbury Park, New Jersey; the Watertown
Red and Blacks; and the Orange AC.
Pro football was popularized in Ohio
when the Massillon Tigers, a strong
amateur team, hired four Pittsburgh
pros to play in the season-ending game
against Akron. At the same time, pro
football declined in the Pittsburgh
area, and the emphasis on the pro game
moved west from Pennsylvania to Ohio.
1904
A field goal was changed from five
points to four.
Ohio had at least seven pro teams,
with Massillon winning the Ohio Independent
Championship, that is, the pro title.
Talk surfaced about forming a state-wide
league to end spiraling salaries brought
about by constant bidding for players
and to write universal rules for the
game. The feeble attempt to start the
league failed.
Halfback Charles Follis signed a contract
with the Shelby (Ohio) AC, making him
the first known black pro football player.
1905
The Canton AC, later to become known
as the Bulldogs, became a professional
team. Massillon again won the Ohio League
championship.
1906
The forward pass was legalized.
The first authenticated pass completion
in a pro game came on October 27, when
George (Peggy) Parratt of Massillon
threw a completion to Dan (Bullet) Riley
in a victory over a combined Benwood-Moundsville
team.
Arch-rivals Canton and Massillon, the
two best pro teams in America, played
twice, with Canton winning the first
game but Massillon winning the second
and the Ohio League championship. A
betting scandal and the financial disaster
wrought upon the two clubs by paying
huge salaries caused a temporary decline
in interest in pro football in the two
cities and, somewhat, throughout Ohio.
1909
A field goal dropped from four points
to three.
