Squire’s record game stands test of time

In 1894, Carl Squire scored 64 points for University in a high school game. It is the oldest standard still on the OHSAA state record books in any sport.

Carl Squire has a claim to fame that is an arduous task at best to match.

He is responsible for the second-most prolific scoring performance ever by a high school football player in Ohio — a staggering 64 points in one game for University in 1894.

It is, by far, the oldest standard still on the Ohio High School Athletic Association state record books in any sport, the last claim the 19th century can make to anything in this regard.

The “prize” that brings well more than a century later, though, is confusion rooted in an odd legacy of being misidentified and largely forgotten. That is, until now. Somewhere in the compilation of football lore in the Buckeye State, Squire was incorrectly pluralized into Squires.

But Squire was actually part of a Cleveland society standard bearer family. His father, Andrew Squire, was a prominent attorney, the founding partner in what is today Squire Patton Boggs, one of the world’s most wellknown law firms.

The Squires lived at Valleevue Farm, adjacent to where US’ Hunting Valley campus now sits.

Squire also played baseball at US, including being part of a Cleveland School Athletic Association league title squad in the spring of 1894.

But it was football — a game in its infancy locally at the high school level — in which Squire became indelibly linked with its lineage as a senior fullback in 1894.

That fall marked US’ fifth with a football team. According to “We Are U.S.!” — a book written by Donald C. Molten in 1990 to mark the school’s 100th anniversary and chart its athletic history — US didn’t have a full-time football coach until 1897, which left the organization of the team to the team itself.

“In those early years,” Molten wrote, “the captains assumed the responsibility for coaching the team, and managers arranged the schedule. They often received help from local friends of the school who had played college football.”

US’ 1894 football schedule consisted of five games, not including a seasonending contest pitting the school’s seniors against its freshmen, sophomores and juniors. The team was slated to take on Cleveland South, Cleveland Central, the Case freshmen, Cleveland West and Akron, the bulk of the games falling under the CSAA umbrella.

The opening game that made Squire famous occurred Oct. 20, 1894, against Cleveland South. In media reports of the era, it was stated US had four more weeks of practice than its opposition.

The original US campus was on the corner of East 71st Street and Hough Avenue in Cleveland, with the game against South said to be contested on a grass field between the schools.

“On Oct. 20,” the University School Record reported, “the first game of the CSAA took place on our grounds. The game was between University and South High School, and our fellows had a walkover.”

A walkover indeed, as US won, 100-0.

Back then, the scoring system was different. Touchdowns were worth four points, and kicks were called goals, worth two.

US blitzed South and led, 54-0, at halftime after a 35-minute first half.

Squire scored three touchdowns in the first half and kicked seven goals for 26 points. He missed three goals, otherwise the total would have been higher.

After the first three US TDs, the school newspaper said, “From this time on, it was only a question of how large the score would be.”

To start a 25-minute second half, Squire scored four of the next five touchdowns and kicked four goals, giving US an 82-0 lead with eight minutes left. South persisted but could not move the ball and continually turned it over.

US was reported to clearly want triple digits in the last eight minutes, and it came. First was a 70-yard touchdown run by a teammate, after which Squire kicked goal.

Squire contributed the final two touchdowns, and when his goal was converted with a minute left, US reached its milestone for a 100-0 rout.

All told, Squire scored nine touchdowns for 36 points and kicked 14 goals for 28 points for a total of 64 points from one game.

Ironically, Squire didn’t find the end zone at all the next week — US was shut out, 4-0, by Cleveland Central on Oct. 27 — and he was never that prolific again.

That marked US’ lone loss of the year, as it rebounded to blank the Case freshmen, 20-0, on Nov. 10 and Cleveland West, 34-0, on Nov. 17 before taking a train south on the Valley railway to Akron for a 20-6 win Nov. 24, 1894 to cap a 4-1 campaign.

After his game for the Carl Squire had one of the most prolific games in Ohio high school football history on Oct. 20, 1894, for University. His 64 points scored that afternoon are second all-time and is by far the OHSAA’s oldest surviving record.

ages against South, Squire scored five touchdowns and kicked six goals the remainder of the fall. He finished his 1894 senior season with 14 touchdowns and 20 goals for a total of 96 points, twothirds of which came in the South opener.

After graduating from US in 1895, Squire spent two years at Yale. He eventually found his way to San Francisco, met wife Katherine and became a real estate broker in Mill Valley in the northern suburbs of the city. Squire died in San Francisco on June 13, 1944, at the age of 67 and was laid

to rest back home in Lake View Cemetery in Cleveland with his family.

It was nearly 50 years after the crowning athletic achievement of his youth.

Squire’s 64 points were believed to be the most ever in a game in Ohio until it was discovered Erastus “Tunk” Simmons amassed 78 points for Medina in an Oct. 5, 1923, game against Spencer.

But Squire’s one afternoon of brilliance — 123 years later — continues to keep the 19th century linked to high school football today.

COURTESY UNIVERSITY SCHOOL