Who Was Don Downs?

Recently Dianne and I had an enjoyable meal at Ragtime Cafe on Valleydale Road. The restaurant has been operating in Hoover for over three decades. The inside walls are decorated with lots of sports images, much of it related to the University of Alabama, sad to say. Yet I did notice the painting below of an Auburn football player. So who was Don Downs??

As it turns out, Don Downs played wide receiver during the 1960, 1961, and 1962 seasons under Auburn coach Shug Jordan. The Sports Reference site lists him with 21 receptions as a senior, ranked 9th in the SEC. His 13.4 years per catch ranked 7th. Football rosters at Auburn University note that in 1962 he wore number 88, weighed 205 lbs. and was 6-1. His hometown was Birmingham, and he graduated from Ensley High School.

Downs' obituary at al.com has a death date of December 3, 2019. That piece also tells us that he was the first Auburn football player to earn a degree in Forest Management. After graduation Downs worked as a distribution consultant, which allowed him to travel. 

The artist for this painting, which is dated 1959, is Warren Pratt. I have been unable to find anything about him except for a few more paintings similar to this one. One ink and watercolor from 1955 depicts Sonny Humphreys in his University of Tennessee playing days. I also found a pastel Pratt painted of Oakland Athletics pitcher Rollie Fingers and one of Baltimore Orioles player Andy Atchebarren from 1971.  

If you know any more about Don Downs or Warren Pratt, let us know in the comments!

Oh, and if Downs played at Auburn 1960-62, why are the dates on the painting 1958 and 1959??

 

Auburn Postcard: Serum Plant 1918

My brother Richard and I were at mom's house in Huntsville recently and found this postcard in some  family memorabilia. The card, dated by postmark October 26, 1918, was sent by our paternal grandfather, Amos Jasper Wright, Sr., to our grandmother Rosa Mae. He wrote from Auburn, where he had arrived from their home in Gadsden ten days earlier to begin U.S. Army training. He tells her he's alright, that he got the package she sent but there was no mentholated salve. Perhaps he can find some locally, he says. The "Julia" mentioned is his older sister. Amos closes by telling Rosa Mae to write often. Their wedding anniversary is coming up; they married on October 31, 1915. 

My grandmother Rosa Mae, according to one of her journals, "rode the train and visited him a few weeks. Roomed at a Mrs. Whatley's and ate at a Mrs. O'Neal's across the street." The Whatley may have been Mrs. Alma Whatley, one of many Whatleys in Auburn and one who became a prominent businesswoman before her retirement in 1971. Amos was in service 54 days before hurting his back and being discharged on December 9, 1918. Of course, the war had ended by that time. I've written a blog post about his time in Auburn. 

Now, what about the actual card? And that serum plant? 

That facility opened on the campus of the Alabama Polytechnic Institute in 1915. At the time hog cholera was devastating the livestock of farmers, causing millions of dollars worth of losses and interrupting supplies of the important food animal. For several years Charles Allen Cary, who became the first professor of veterinary medicine at Auburn in 1892, had lobbied the state legislature for funds to build a plant to make serum to fight the hog cholera at a price farmers could afford. Finally, $25,000 was appropriated. 

The serum plant building stood on campus into the 1960s. The Harrison School of Pharmacy building is now on the site.

I found the information on Alma Whatley in the "Whatley Road" entry of Sam Hendrix's 2021 book, Auburn: A History in Street Names, pp. 662-664. For more information about Cary, see Hendrix's 2018 book The Cary Legacy: Dr. Charles Allen Cary, Father of Veterinary Medicine at Auburn and in the South. 

My grandfather on the Auburn campus in 1918 with that iconic tower in the background. We still have that jacket he's wearing. He also brought back the pennant below. The note was written by my dad, Amos J. Wright, Jr. 

 

Dr. Cary, center with sleeve rolled up, conducts a hog cholera inoculation demonstration for a group of county agents, probably about the time he succeeded in getting a hog cholera serum plant built at Auburn in 1915.

Source: The Cary Legacy

Ads in the Auburn Plainsman on February 7, 1945

I was recently sifting through a box of old newspapers that came from my paternal grandparents' house in Gadsden. I've written about them, Amos J. and Rosa Mae Wright, in a previous post and hope to do others in the future. This particular box of treasures contained mostly the front page section of many issues of the Gadsden Times published during World War II. I assume my grandmother saved them; she seemed to be the archivist of that couple. Naturally there is a lot of interesting war news, but the issues also have fascinating material from the Gadsden area and around the state and elsewhere. I imagine there are numerous possible blog posts buried there.....

But I digress. I also came across this random issue of the Auburn Plainsman, the university's student newspaper. My Dad, Amos J. Jr., was enrolled at Alabama Polytechnic Institute at this time, before a couple of years in the Navy just after the war ended. I didn't find too much of interest except some fascinating advertisements, so here we are. 

The Plainsman had begun publication in 1922; you can find past issues here. The issue I found was six pages; the sheet with pages three and four is missing. I'm not sure why this random issue was saved, but perhaps Dad brought it home as a sample to show his mother while he was enrolled at Auburn.

I've made a number of comments below the ads, with help from these sources:

Ralph Draughon, Jr, et al. Lost Auburn: A Village Remembered in Period Photographs [2012]

Sam Hendrix, Auburn: A History in Street Names [2021]

The first Tiger Theatre opened in 1925 and closed in the summer 1928 so the next bigger one could be built. The new building had over 700 seats and closed on April 26, 1984. I seem to remember seeing Who'll Stop the Rain? there, the 1978 film with Nick Nolte and Tuesday Weld. The film was based on Robert Stone's 1974 novel Dog Soldiers, which is well worth reading. 

Hat Check Honey was released on March 10, 1944; many films took longer to make their way around in the country in those days. The Very Thought of You came out on October 20, 1944. The Pearl of Death, released on August 1, 1944, was a Sherlock Holmes film so I probably would have gone to see that one. 

The Windmill operated from the 1930s until 1951, when its beer license was revoked for selling to minors and other offenses. In the 1930s and early 1940s it was the only place in the Auburn area to obtain legal alcohol. The place was frequented by veterans in school at Auburn; no co-eds were allowed. The entrance was a faux windmill. The business was really a gas station with a few booths and tables inside. 

I did not find any information on the Varsity. 

Auburn Grille advertised as "an institution within itself." The Greek immigrants John and Lucas Gazes operated the Grille and Roy's Place. The Grille was the first restaurant with air conditioning in Lee County and  was named for the Auburn automobile, manufactured in Auburn, Indiana, from 1900 until 1937. Their father Emmanuel Gazes operated the Auburn Cafe from 1907 until 1921. The family was also involved in various other eating places, including what became the War Eagle Supper Club.

Some of these places such as Roy's and the Windmill operated outside city limits since according to state law at the time alcohol could not be served inside the limits.

War Eagle Theater was part of the Martin chain & the first chain theater in Auburn. This one must have been known as Martin Theater and later renamed.

By 1982 there were 300 Martin Theaters in the southeastern U.S. In that year the chain's owner, Fuqua Industries sold the chain to Carmike Cinemas. In 2016 Carmike was purchased by AMC Theatres. 

This particular Martin opened on August 19, 1948 and closed in 1985. In October 1970 it hosted the first Alabama showing of I Walk the Line, based on the novel An Exile by Madison Jones [1925-2012], long-time faculty member at AU. 

One of the films showing that I especially note and have enjoyed was To Have and Have Not, released in October 1944 and starring Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall. The movie was based on Ernest Hemingway's 1937 novel. 

"Chief" Shine provided the first rental car service in Auburn.

I did not find anything about this establishment, even in a general Google search.

That Time Auburn Scored on Sewanee!

I recently watched the 2022 documentary Unrivaled: Sewanee 1899 about that year's football team at the University of the South, a small, private liberal arts college in the Tennessee town. The film is a fascinating look at what is often called the greatest team in college football history. The Tigers played twelve games between October 21 and December 3 that season, including an incredible November road trip of five in six days. No opponent scored on Sewanee except Auburn. Let's investigate. 

College football was a very different sport in those days. The game had evolved somewhat from the ones played in the 1860's and 1870's that resembled rugby. In the 1880's the influence of Walter Camp brought a number of changes still in use today. Camp, who played at Yale and then coached there and at Stanford, introduced the line of scrimmage, the center snap to the quarterback, and the modern day size of the field. 

In 1899 touchdowns and field goals were scored at five points each and conversions [point after touchdown] were a single point. At the time of Sewanee's great season, the forward pass had not yet been invented. The quarterback took the snap and handed off to another player, then becoming another blocker. There were no offensive and defensive squads; players stayed in for the entire game unless injured too badly--which usually required a broken bone. 

Auburn and Sewanee were members of the same conference. As noted by Wikipedia, "The beginnings of the contemporary Southeastern Conference and Atlantic Coast Conference start in 1894. The Southern Intercollegiate Athletic Association (SIAA) was founded on December 21, 1894, by William Dudley, a chemistry professor at Vanderbilt.^[47] The original members were Alabama, Auburn, Georgia, Georgia Tech, North Carolina, Sewanee, and Vanderbilt. Clemson, Cumberland, Kentucky, LSU, Mercer, Mississippi, Mississippi A&M (Mississippi State), Southwestern Presbyterian University, Tennessee, Texas, Tulane, and the University of Nashville joined the following year in 1895 as invited charter members.^[48] The conference was originally formed for "the development and purification of college athletics throughout the South".^[49]"

The coach of Sewanee was Billy Suter, in his first year at that position. He had seven
starters back from the 1898 team, which went 4-0. By all accounts he was a strict
disciplinarian. He coached at Sewanee until 1901, then one year at Georgetown
before leaving the profession for publishing. 

Sewanee's victims in 1899 included Tennessee (46-0), Texas (12-0), Tulane (23-0), 
and LSU (34-0). They outscored opponents 322-10. Although the team had twenty-
one students who played that year, only thirteen made the brutal road trip.

The Tigers from the Plains were 3-0-1 going into the Sewanee game, so the players
were no doubt rested and ready. Auburn had not played a game since November
18 when they tied Georgia 0-0. Earlier in the season Auburn defeated by large
margins three teams, including Georgia Tech and Clemson, that did not score a
point. 

Auburn's coach John Heisman , in his fifth year at the school, had a much different
career. In addition to football, he coached basketball and baseball at various schools.
He coached at Oberlin before arriving in Auburn in 1895; he left there after the 
1899 season. Others stops in football included Clemson, Georgia Tech, Penn and 
Rice. His contributions to the game included an early player shift, the hidden ball
play, and efforts to legalize the forward pass and divide the game time into quarters.

The Sewanee-Auburn contest was played on November 30, Thanksgiving Day, at
Riverside Park in Montgomery. Accounts give the attendance as 3000 or 4000.
I wonder if the site was at or near the current Riverfront Park along the Alabama River.
I did find a description in The Works of Matthew Blue, Montgomery's First Historian,
edited by Mary Ann Neeley, that seems to locate the park there. "The depot was near
the river on the west side of north Court Street. The area extended along the riverbank
and was later known as Riverside Park, where subsequent fairs and events took place." 
[p. 218]. 

An interesting sidelight to this game is the fact that Sewanee had two players from Alabama, both at the halfback position. Ringland F. "Rex" Kilpatrick was from Bridgeport and Henry "Diddy" Seibels from Montgomery. 

Early Auburn football has a connection with another interesting team and game. In 1914 the Carlisle Indians from Pennsylvania made a southern tour during the season and played both Alabama and Auburn. They defeated Alabama, but lost to Auburn. You can read the details here. 

Two descriptions of the game can be read below. Sewanee managed to win by one point even though Auburn gained 323 total yards to their 82. On December 4 a long article about the game appeared in the Birmingham Post-Herald under the title "Coach Heisman Scores Officials". Heisman was critical of the officiating, to say the least. 

Savannah Morning News 1 December 1899

Source: Chronicling America

Birmingham Age-Herald 1 December 1899

Source: Chronicling America

The 1899 Sewanee football team, known as the "Iron Men". Twenty-one different students played on the team. Not shown are the two black men who served as trainers, giving massages to exhausted players including during the famous road trip. Their story is included in the 2022 documentary. 

Source: Wikipedia 

Auburn's 1899 team

Source: Wikipedia

Alabama Photos of the Day: Two Auburn Bookstores in 1950

I recently ran across these first two photos in one of Auburn University Libraries' digital collections and being a retired librarian and bookstore denizen since the days of my youth, they grabbed my attention. Let's investigate. The photos show the interior of two bookstores in Auburn in 1950, Hawkins' and Burton's. The quotes about each store come from the linked source. At some point Mr. Hawkins died and a bookstore entrepreneur from Tuscaloosa named Paul Malone purchased the store and renamed it Malone's. George Johnston had been working there and took over management; he purchased the store in 1953. The Johnston family took full control in 1960 and renamed it Johnston and Malone, which became J&M in 1968. That's how the store was known when I arrived in Auburn in June 1970. You can read more about J&M here, here and here. I've found nothing yet on Mr. Hawkins' background, but that's not the case with with the founder of the other store, Robert Wilton Burton. Although born in Georgia in 1848, he grew up in Lafayette and spent most of his adult life in the Auburn area. After the Civil War he taught school in Lee County and Opelika until he and his brother opened a bookstore in that town. In 1878 faculty members at the college then known as the Agricultural and Mechanical College of Alabama asked him to open a bookstore in Auburn to serve the school and community. Burton's Book Store became a center of literary and intellectual life and operated until 1968. Before his death in 1917 Burton published numerous poems and humorous stories in newspapers and national magazines. With the income he built a one-story house for his family affectionately called the "Four-Story Cottage". Although listed on the National Register of Historical Places in 1980, the Queen Anne-style house on East Magnolia Street was demolished in 1993. In May 1957 Paul Malone was one of the incorporators of Malone's Book Store, Inc. in Tuscaloosa. The business was dissolved in 1968. I raided my parents' collection of Auburn University yearbooks from ca. 1947-1950 and other sources for book store ads and photos beyond the two I found initially. I couldn't stop myself and have included them below in order to create a mini-history of bookstores in Auburn. I wonder if my parents are in either of these photographs. They were at Auburn in 1950. If you have any information or memories about these stores, please tell us in the comments section. UPDATE 19 March 2022 One Auburn bookstore I didn't discuss was Anders, which closed recently after 56 years in business. Hawkins Bookstore in 1950 "Hawkin's Bookstore in Auburn in 1950 was called 'The Friendly Bookstore.' George and Paul Malone took over the store years later and named it Johnston and Malone's." Source: C. Harry Knowles Photographs Collection, Auburn University Libraries Burton's Bookstore in 1950 "Auburn's Burton's Bookstore in 1950 packed with students getting their books from the quarter. Robert Wilton Burton opened the first bookstore in Auburn in 1878 for then Agricultural and Mechanical College of Alabama. The slogan for Burton's, on East Magnolia and South College, was "Something New Everyday." It closed its doors in 1968 after 90 years." Source: C. Harry Knowles Photographs Collection, Auburn University Libraries Advertisement from the 1949 Glomerata, Auburn University's yearbook Advertisement from the 1948 Glomerata, Auburn University's yearbook Advertisement from the 1949 Glomerata, Auburn University's yearbook Advertisement from the 1947 Glomerata, Auburn University's yearbook Advertisement from the 1948 Glomerata, Auburn University's yearbook Advertisement from the 1949 Glomerata, Auburn University's yearbook Advertisement from the 1950 Glomerata, Auburn University's yearbook In this photograph taken around 1910, we are looking down what is now College Street in Auburn. The building on the right in front of the water tower is Burton's  Book Store. Toomer's Drug Store is the building with the awning.  Source: Auburn University Digital Library  At some point a Wright Brothers Book Store operated in Auburn. "The water tower behind reveals its location on the north side of Magnolia Avenue a few doors east of Toomer's Drug Store. Source: Ralph Draughon, Jr., Delos Hughes & Ann Pearson, Lost Auburn: A Village  Remembered in Period Photographs. New South Books, 2012, p. 129 J & M Bookstore today Source: J & M website

Alabama Photo of the Day: Amphitheater at Auburn University

In recent wanderings through Alabama Mosaic I came across this 1940's photograph of the amphitheater on Auburn University's campus. I seem to remember seeing a few events there in my time at Auburn during the 1970's.

The formal name of the facility is the Graves Centre and Amphitheatre. As noted below, the location has been used for various assemblies over the years. The Centre was a facility for agriculture and then fisheries conferences and the original 30 cottages housed guests.. Athletics the occupied the cottages for a while. When the cottages were torn down is unknown. The amphitheater is built of Belgian granite blocks from the streets of Montgomery. 

Also below is a link to the Change.org petition seeking to remove the name of Alabama governor David Bibb Graves from the facility. 

Apparently there s a plan for another amphitheater to be built at the school's Ag Heritage Park. 

The amphitheater about 1940 with two guest cottages in the background

Source: Alabama Dept. of Archives and History 

A more recent photo of the amphitheater taken from a Change.org petition to remove the name of David Bibb Graves from the facility. 

These two images appear in Lengthening Shadows that contains information about Auburn University buildings up to the time of publication in 1977. 

David Bibb Graves [1873-1942]

Source: Encyclopedia of Alabama

That Time the Carlisle Indians Played Alabama & Auburn

The Carlisle Indian Industrial School, formally known as the United States Indian Industrial School, opened in Carlisle, Pennsylvania, on November 1, 1879, with 147 students enrolled. The institution was the first federally funded school for Native Americans not located on a reservation. By the time the school closed on September 1, 1918, over 10,000 children from 140 tribes had attended the school, but only 150 graduated. In 1951 the complex became part of the U.S. Army War College and today is a National Historic Landmark. 

Among its many notable activities while the school operated was the Carlisle Indians football team. In the early 20th century the teams competed with and often won against powerful college teams across the country. Players were usually smaller than their opponents, which resulted in the adoption of many "trick" plays. Two that have long been standard were fake hand-offs and the overhand spiral forward pass. 

During their 25 seasons the Indians compiled a record of 167-88-13. That 0.647 winning percentage is the best of any defunct major college football program. Over the years Carlisle played away games against these schools and many others and often won: Penn State, Wisconsin, Illinois, California, Virginia, Utah, Northwestern, Ohio State, Minnesota, Harvard, Brown, Army and Cornell. 

The most famous individual associated with Carlisle is undoubtedly Jim Thorpe. In the introduction to his Wikipedia article is this summary of his career:

Thorpe became the first Native American to win a gold medal for the United States. Considered one of the most versatile athletes of modern sports, he won Olympic gold medals in the 1912 pentathlon and decathlon, and played American football (collegiate and professional), professional baseball, and basketball. He lost his Olympic titles after it was found he had been paid for playing two seasons of semi-professional baseball before competing in the Olympics, thus violating the amateurism rules that were then in place. In 1983, 30 years after his death, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) restored his Olympic medals.

Thorpe played football at Carlisle in 1911 and 1912, so he was not a member of the team that played Alabama and Auburn. The 1911 team went 11-1 and the 1912 team 12-1-1 and captured the national championship. 

Thorpe's coach was Glenn Scobey "Pop" Warner, who was also coaching the team in 1914. Warner played football at Cornell and then built a spectacular college coaching career. His stops as head coach included Iowa State, Georgia, Cornell [twice], Carlisle [twice], Pittsburgh, Stanford and Temple. His teams won three national championship at Pittsburgh and one at Stanford. His final record was 319-106-32. He "retired" after the 1938 season at Temple, but spent the next two years coaching the offense at San Jose State.

The 1914 season was not one of Carlisle's best; the team finished 5-10-1. Wins included contests against Albight, Lebanon Valley, West Virginia Weslyan, Dickinson, and the tie against Holy Cross. Carlisle lost to Penn, Pittsburgh and Syracuse among others In their only game against Notre Dame, they lost 48-0 at Camiskey Park in Chicago.  

D.V. Graves coached Alabama in 1914, his final of four years as the school's head football coach. At that time he was early in his career coaching college football, basketball and baseball. He ended up coaching baseball at the University of Washington for 24 years, retiring in 1946. 

In those days Alabama played its home games in two places, the Quad on campus and Rickwood Field in Birmingham. In 1914 the team's record was 5-4, 3-3 in Southern Intercollegiate Athletic Association play. Four games were played at The Quad: Howard, Birmingham College, Tulane & Chattanooga. All were won by shutouts except Chattanooga, which managed three points. Four games were played at Rickwood: Georgia Tech, Sewanee, Mississippi A&M & Carlisle. The only win at Rickwood was against Tech, 13-0. Carlisle beat the Crimson Tide 20-3. The Tennessee game, which the Tide lost 17-7, was played at Waite Field in Knoxville. 

Auburn's coach in 1914 became almost as legendary as Pop Warner. As Wikipedia summarizes:

Michael Joseph "Iron Mike" Donahue (June 14, 1876 – December 11, 1960) was an American football player, coach of football, basketball, baseball, tennis, track, soccer, and golf, and a college athletics administrator. He served as the head football coach at Auburn University (1904–1906, 1908–1922), at Louisiana State University (1923–1927), and at Spring Hill College (1934).

In 18 seasons coaching football at Auburn, Donahue amassed a record of 106–35–5 and had three squads go undefeated with four more suffering only one loss. His .743 career winning percentage is the second highest in Auburn history, surpassing notable coaches such as John Heisman and Ralph "Shug" Jordan. Donahue Drive in Auburn, Alabama, on which Jordan–Hare Stadium is located and the Tiger Walk takes place, is named in his honor, as is Mike Donahue Drive on the LSU campus.

Donahue also coached basketball (1905–1921), baseball, track, and soccer (1912–?)^[1] at Auburn and baseball (1925–1926) and tennis (1946–1947) at LSU. He was inducted as a coach into the College Football Hall of Fame as part of its inaugural class in 1951.

Donahue was a native of Ireland and attended Yale University where he lettered in football, basketball, track and cross-country. Even though only 5'4" tall, he also played substitute quarterback for the team. He graduated in 1903 and began his first stint as Auburn head football coach the following year. 

The 1914 team became one of Donahue's best, finishing 8-0-1 and outscoring opponents 193-0. They finished their 23rd year of football as champions of the Southern Intercollegiate Athletic Association. James Howell's power ratings system gives Auburn the national championship that year, but the school does not claim it.

Auburn played some  games in 1914 at Drake Field and others at Rickwood Field in Birmingham. Auburn defeated Clemson 28-0 and two other teams, Marion Military Institute and West Alabama Athletic Club, at Drake Field. Wins at Rickwood were against Mississippi A&M 19-0 and Vanderbilt 6-0 in bad weather. In the second contest of the season Auburn defeated Florida 20-0 in Jacksonville. In Atlanta the team beat Georgia Tech 14-0 at Grant Field and were held to a scoreless tie by Georgia at Piedmont Park. In the final game of their season Auburn defeated Carlisle 7-0 at Piedmont. 

In 1914 Auburn was a southern football powerhouse. Carlisle played them and the Tide in the waning days of the school's football program; its glory years had come and gone. In the 1920's Alabama would enter one of its periods of gridiron glory.

The South has produced many great football teams over the decades, but few can match the 1899 Sewanee Tigers. In the late 19th and early 20th centuries the University of the South, or Sewanee, a small school in the Tennessee mountains, was a dominating force in the region's football. 

That 1899 squad reached a pinnacle, outscoring opponents 322-10 on the way to twelve wins. Five of those shutouts came on a six-day road trip during which the 13-man team defeated Texas, Texas A&M, Tulane, LSU and Ole Miss. The only team to score against Sewanee? Why, the Auburn Tigers, of course! War Eagle! In that year they were coached by the legendary John Heisman in the last of his five years at Auburn. Sewanee was the only team to beat them that year.

Included below are brief contemporary newspaper items about the games Carlisle played with Alabama and Auburn. Unfortunately, I did not find any detailed accounts. However, we can get a few interesting tidbits of information from these pieces. 

Alabama met Carlisle at Rickwood Field in Birmingham on Wednesday, December 2. Carlisle's "superior weight proved too much" for Alabama, and the Indians won 20-3. Alabama could not make consistent gains against Carlisle's defense. The Indians used "variegated delayed passes which were very effective."

Carlisle arrived in Atlanta on Friday, December 4, for the last college game of the season in the South, a "post-season" game as one paper described it. Of course, no bowl games were played in those days. One had taken place in 1902;  an annual bowl did not begin until 1916 with the precursor of the Rose Bowl.

The Auburn team arrived the following morning. The game "which has attracted much interest over the South" probably took place on a soft field due to recent heavy rains. "Football critics" declared Carlisle to be superior in the open style of play and predicted a close game. Carlisle was favored even though Auburn had not been scored upon all season and had a weight advantage. Once again Auburn kept its opponent scoreless in a 7-0 win.

The Carlisle football team had traveled to the Deep South eight years earlier. They challenged Vanderbilt to a game, which was played in Nashville in November 1906. Vanderbilt won by a field goal, the only points scored. 

More information and comments are below the images that follow.

Carlisle pupils ca.. 1900

Source: Wikipedia

Jim Thorpe in his uniform for the professional Canton Bulldogs sometime between 1915 and 1920

Source: Wikipedia 

1914 Carlisle Indians football team

Source

Glenn Scobey Warner [1874-1954] in 1921

Source: Wikipedia

University of Alabama football team in 1914

Source

Alabama football coach D.V. Graves in 1945

Source: Wikipedia

Alabama Polytechnic Institute [Auburn] football team in 1914
You can read player identifications at the source, Wikipedia. Number 1 in the upper left is the coach, Mike Donahue.

Auburn football coach Mike Donahue, ca. 1909

Source: Wikipedia

The final item giving Saturday events includes the Auburn-Carlisle game.

Source: Topeka State Journal  [Kansas] 30 Nov 1914

Source: Norwich Bulletin [Conn.] 3 December 1914

Source: Bridgeport Evening Farmer [Conn.] 5 Dec 1914

Source: Ogden Standard [Utah] 5 December 1914

Source: Richmond Times-Dispatch [Virginia] 5 December 1914

Postcard showing Rickwood Field on opening day 18 August 1910. Rickwood was constructed as a baseball stadium and primarily used for that sport ever since. The Birmingham Barons minor league team played there for many years before moving first to a new stadium in Hoover and then one in downtown Birmingham. 

 The facility is the oldest professional baseball field existing in the U.S. Over the years other sports have been played in it; rock concerts were held there in the in the 1970's. 

Source: Rickwood Field Timeline

A modern day scene at Piedmont Park 

Source: Wikimedia


In 1892 the park was the site of a football game between Auburn and the University of Georgia. Auburn won 10-0 in what has become known as the "Deep South's Oldest Rivalry". In those days Georgia's mascot was a goat; the team did not officially become the "Bulldogs" until 1921. Rumor has it that the goat was barbecued by Georgia fans after the game.