The Morning Journal (Lorain, OH)
Greater Cleveland faced pandemic, war in fall 1918
The sports landscape in 2020 has a great deal of unknown to maneuver during the novel coronavirus outbreak.
Football in the fall of 1918 at the high school and college levels, though, had two enormous challenges to encounter.
Not only was football being played at the height of a massive flu pandemic.
It was also being played as World War I was waged.
The structure of sports — and schools, for that matter — was unique as well.
And the challenges for athletic competition are not entirely unlike those faced today, when the time can eventually arrive for sports to return in some form.
The United States government requested for the fall of 1918 for high schools and colleges and universities to incorporate military training.
Some high schools, including in Greater Cleveland, were used as officer training units. Across the country, more than 300 colleges and universities were asked by the War Department’s subcommittee for education and training to begin Student Army Training Corps, or SATCs. The schools would have commandants in charge of those programs.
High schools allotted 45 minutes daily for military training, and sports were also classified as part of the military training system. In turn, prospective high school athletes who weren’t deemed proficient in a military manual were not allowed to represent their school in sports.
University School was planning to take an especially hard hit as the start of its school year awaited Sept. 17, 1918. US football coach Maurice Briggs noted, in addition to 10 players lost to graduation and another to armed forces enlistment, six of his most promising student-athletes and 14 overall had been involved in summer military training. Two did so at military camps out of state, and another did so at Culver’s military academy. Robert Pennock, US’ football captainelect, spent his summer training at Camp Kewaydin in Ontario.
Due to a vaguely worded communication from the war department, colleges were initially concerned and confused over whether they could field football at all for the duration of the war. A bulletin asked college and university SATCs to not make any schedule plans for the upcoming season.
Case coach Pat Pasini, who would later serve long stints at the high school level locally with Kirtland and Willoughby Union, was told by a colonel in charge of the program that college sports were being encouraged, but with a catch. The schedule mapped out for schools’ military training left one afternoon window from 4:30 to 5:30 p.m., during which teams would have to prepare the field, practice and get back in cadet uniform. In addition, Saturday training had to go until 3 p.m., Pasini was told by Major Ralph Mitchell in Washington.
Major Edwards, the commandant at Case, believed he had “no authority” to grant leave of absence for student-athletes in intercollegiate sports. The school’s athletic manager, Frank Van Horn, opined if the school’s football schedule had to be cut, it may as well be cut entirely.
The concerns extended to the larger colleges as well, particularly in the Big Ten, including the powerful team from the University of Chicago and Ohio State, which feared its season may have to be scrapped.
“Every able-bodied student will be enrolled in the military unit and will live exactly under training camp conditions, devoting 14 hours weekly to military drill and 42 hours weekly to academic studies on military problems,” University of Chicago official David Robertson explained. “Under that program, there will be no time for football. It would be impossible to spare the time to train men for the game. The great need, of course, is the development of officers for the army, and if football must be given up, there will be no other course to pursue.”
Chicago’s legendary coach wasn’t amused.
“I can see no reason for the suspension of the sport,” Amos Alonso Stagg stated. “Football undoubtedly would make better officers. Every member of the 1916 University of Minnesota 11, both regular and substitute, is an officer in the army, and they are giving a good account of themselves in France. Former stars of Chicago’s football field also are making good as officers.”
Western Reserve even announced it was abandoning intercollegiate football for the rest of the war.
Relief for all came from a clarification from the War Department. Colleges could arrange a schedule with games at home or three hours away or less in October,
then with two “long trips” in November that had to start Friday night and end by Sunday night door to door.
Schools took the order and were willing to comply.
“Athletic sports as formerly pursued involving extended trips and specialized training are inconsistent with the soldier’s program of drill and study,” War Department committee chairman Col. R.I. Rees said. “... It will be the policy to strongly encourage athletic sports within each institution and with neighboring institutions in cases where the distances are so short as to necessitate no interruption of the weekly academic and military training.”
For Case grads on the front lines of World War I, they had one aspiration when it came to their alma mater’s football team in 1918: Beat archrival Western Reserve on Thanksgiving Day.
“It’s just about time for the old football fever to crop out, and I have been affected as usual,” wrote Otto Hense, captain of Case’s 1916 team, to Pasini. “I imagine football is of minor importance back home and that you have lost many of your men to the colors. However, war cannot make me forget being humbled by Reserve.”
College football did get to its opening week in October, including Case getting ready to head to Michigan, and Western Reserve traveling across town to take on Baldwin Wallace.
High school football got going as well, including University losing to Cleveland West and tying Cleveland Central. In the Central tie, on a light note, local media accounts attributed Central’s inability to win the game due to new rules that didn’t allow for footballs to have handles anymore.
Football had a bigger problem than that, however, deeper into October.
The flu outbreak worldwide was at its worst in October 1918.
The Cleveland health department closed schools in turn, leaving football coaches concerned some players would not return to school, finding employment instead.
Senate League schools shut down practices and games, but a few schools held out hope. US practiced in the mornings after the school closure was announced, and Cleveland Heights resorted to practicing off-campus at the Chagrin Valley Hunt Club. US attempted to schedule a game with St. Ignatius, but to no avail.
Colleges and military training stations with football teams comprised of college-age players had to get even more creative.
An aviation cadet team from Wilbur Wright Field in Dayton wanted to play Cleveland’s Naval Reserve squad at League Park or US’ field two blocks away.
Under strict protocol with the ban in place, if Cleveland health commissioner H.L. Rockwood wouldn’t allow the aviation cadets to travel north by train, the cadets offered to fly in and stay in quarantine throughout their stay in Cleveland and return to Dayton. A Detroit Naval Reserve team offered to arrive by boat.
For a game against Wooster, Case officials, including Pasini, visited Rockwood with an offer. The game would be played behind closed gates. Only Case students who had been under quarantine would be present, along with Wooster players under a strict quarantine from when they left campus, came to Cleveland and then returned home.
Rockwood agreed. At the time, a permit was needed from the health department for any public gathering. Since admission was being eliminated, though, there was no need for a permit.
Case also played a closedgate game against Hiram and won, 41-2, in the rain on a muddy field. Fans learned of the game and tried to access the field but were turned away since the health department and the school closed the gates.
Western Reserve canceled a road game against the Michigan Aggies (what is today Michigan State) in East Lansing, since no interstate travel was allowed. Instead, the school completed army unit inductions and students entered a twoweek quarantine, along with Ohio Northern, so the football teams could play later in October. The public would be cordoned off from the student body and football teams in a separate portion of the stands.
Pasini later contracted flu but recovered. He and other sick members of the squad went into voluntary quarantine.
Down at Akron, which had a game postponed against Western Reserve, 500 students were placed in quarantine as a precaution, although none were said to have the flu. The hope was to reschedule in late October or after Thanksgiving. To ensure the quarantine, guards were placed around the student barracks.
Teams at the high school and college level continued to practice, with the high schools doing so without coaches. The thought from officials allowing practice was being outdoors in fresh air was better than being trapped indoors. Practices were eventually halted as well.
Case then had to cancel a game at Ohio Wesleyan after that school went into flu quarantine, and Case awaited inoculations for their students.
The health department reopened schools by late October.
The high school football halt lasted approximately four weeks. Greater Cleveland teams were said to be willing to play two games per week to shorten the schedule, but most could not play full schedules. US managed three games that season, going 0-2-1.
Hense didn’t get his wish — Western Reserve won that Thanksgiving Day tilt, 14-7, on Nov. 29. The Big Ten pushed conference games to November, and high school games were played into early December.
By the end of 1918, the wars were winding down — against an enemy at home and abroad.
But not before one of the most chaotic football seasons ever contested.