WEBVTT - CLASSIC: Teddy Roosevelt May Just Have Saved Modern (American) Football 0:00:00.120 --> 0:00:04.200 And we have returned, fellow Ridiculous Historians with a classic 0:00:04.280 --> 0:00:08.000 episode for you this week. This comes with a very 0:00:08.080 --> 0:00:12.000 special shout out to our one of our number one guys, 0:00:12.160 --> 0:00:17.079 nol our super producer, mister Max Williams, who will always 0:00:17.239 --> 0:00:20.279 know more about sports than either you or me. 0:00:21.079 --> 0:00:24.799 Agree, it's like a superpower, Max. 0:00:24.640 --> 0:00:24.799 Do you? 0:00:24.960 --> 0:00:27.200 Uh No, I don't know. 0:00:27.360 --> 0:00:30.480 You hadn't quite joined the show yet, but you're familiar 0:00:30.520 --> 0:00:32.839 with the idea of football, right, Uh? 0:00:32.920 --> 0:00:36.720 I washed the game, or I've seen a game or 0:00:36.720 --> 0:00:38.360 two in my day. 0:00:39.360 --> 0:00:42.960 I know I got to stop sounding like an alien impersonating. 0:00:43.440 --> 0:00:46.560 Football before and even kicked it once. 0:00:47.000 --> 0:00:50.560 You've touched some pig skin, right, did they did? Lucy 0:00:50.640 --> 0:00:52.640 pull it out right at the last minute? 0:00:54.120 --> 0:00:57.760 It was football? 0:00:58.440 --> 0:00:58.600 Yeah? 0:00:58.720 --> 0:01:00.959 Kick him in the ball head? Oh no, too far? 0:01:01.600 --> 0:01:01.880 Rude? 0:01:02.640 --> 0:01:05.400 Also, why is he the Lucy of our show? Anyway? 0:01:06.319 --> 0:01:11.080 For this this episode is for fans of American football, 0:01:11.240 --> 0:01:16.800 so not soccer, and fans of president's past. It turns 0:01:16.800 --> 0:01:21.759 out that Teddy Roosevelt from earlier just may have been 0:01:21.800 --> 0:01:25.360 the saving force of modern American football. 0:01:25.920 --> 0:01:27.720 Let's just jump right anyway, what do you say? 0:01:31.000 --> 0:01:59.440 Ridiculous History is a production of iHeartRadio. The following episode 0:01:59.720 --> 0:02:03.080 is going to be of you know, so it's going 0:02:03.120 --> 0:02:06.080 to be about something ridiculous, but it's also going to 0:02:06.120 --> 0:02:10.720 be a peak into US culture for a lot of 0:02:10.919 --> 0:02:15.880 our fellow ridiculous historians listening outside of the United States. 0:02:16.280 --> 0:02:21.560 We are today talking about football, American football, American football, 0:02:21.680 --> 0:02:25.480 and there's going to necessarily be some roughness in this 0:02:25.520 --> 0:02:27.560 episode that maybe necessary roughness. 0:02:27.800 --> 0:02:29.760 No, what was necessary rough It was just. 0:02:29.639 --> 0:02:33.000 A raunchy like nineties American football comedy. 0:02:33.080 --> 0:02:35.720 I believe Who are you? Oh? 0:02:35.720 --> 0:02:39.200 I'm Noel and I am an aficionado of raunchy nineties 0:02:39.560 --> 0:02:40.919 football based comedies. 0:02:41.280 --> 0:02:43.359 Yes, yes, yes, that's how we met. I did my 0:02:43.440 --> 0:02:47.320 undergrad in that. Actually all facts. I am Ben, and 0:02:47.720 --> 0:02:50.960 this is ridiculous history. But it would not be ridiculous 0:02:51.000 --> 0:02:54.600 history without our super producer, Casey Pegreb. 0:02:56.120 --> 0:02:58.600 I just want to acknowledge that American football also a 0:02:58.639 --> 0:02:59.120 great band. 0:02:59.280 --> 0:03:01.920 YEP, kind of a what is it? What would you 0:03:01.919 --> 0:03:02.200 call them? 0:03:02.240 --> 0:03:05.959 This little emo emo, but way more on the tolerable 0:03:05.960 --> 0:03:07.200 side as far as I'm concerned. 0:03:07.280 --> 0:03:07.799 No, they're good. 0:03:08.120 --> 0:03:11.399 They're kind of jangling, they don't like, they don't wind scream. Yeah, 0:03:11.560 --> 0:03:13.160 it's kind of a little more low key, and the 0:03:13.160 --> 0:03:16.160 guitars are kind of jangly and arpeggioe, kind of I 0:03:16.200 --> 0:03:16.560 dig it. 0:03:16.520 --> 0:03:20.239 And they have reunited after many years Dormance that was 0:03:20.240 --> 0:03:21.200 a third album coming out. 0:03:21.240 --> 0:03:23.040 I will say this though, for some reason, the name 0:03:23.120 --> 0:03:26.560 American Football, it's just very bland sounding. It sounds like 0:03:26.560 --> 0:03:28.960 they'd be a very bland kind of vanilla band, and they. 0:03:28.919 --> 0:03:29.440 Sort of are. 0:03:29.600 --> 0:03:32.720 I mean, it's an approachable emo. That's what I call it, 0:03:32.800 --> 0:03:33.640 approachable emo. 0:03:33.960 --> 0:03:34.840 Casey on the case. 0:03:36.360 --> 0:03:40.720 Well, today's story actually has a pretty cool Atlanta connection, 0:03:40.760 --> 0:03:43.320 which is where we find ourselves right now. Back in 0:03:43.400 --> 0:03:47.160 eighteen ninety seven, there was a full back at the 0:03:47.280 --> 0:03:52.920 University of Georgia named Richard von Gammon, and he was 0:03:53.360 --> 0:03:58.240 playing with his team against the Virginia team, which is 0:03:58.280 --> 0:04:02.160 a college team. And in those days, it was quite 0:04:02.240 --> 0:04:07.480 common for players to be brutally injured, and this was 0:04:07.520 --> 0:04:12.080 no exception. He was rushed and dogpiled on and was 0:04:12.080 --> 0:04:15.520 at the bottom of this heap of humanity and he 0:04:15.880 --> 0:04:21.520 started he received this hit and then began to vomit blood, 0:04:22.160 --> 0:04:26.760 and they realized that he was dying on this football field. 0:04:27.160 --> 0:04:33.200 Right They eventually realized what happened. The team doctor popped 0:04:33.200 --> 0:04:36.920 the guy with a syringe full of morphine and then 0:04:37.080 --> 0:04:40.919 noticed the blood was coming from Richard von Gammon's head. 0:04:41.600 --> 0:04:44.960 Von Gammon, you see, had suffered a skull fracture and 0:04:45.400 --> 0:04:49.120 a concussion. He was placed in a horse drawn carriage 0:04:49.400 --> 0:04:54.599 headed for Grady Hospital and he died in the hospital overnight. 0:04:54.800 --> 0:04:55.000 Yeah. 0:04:55.000 --> 0:04:58.599 In that scene that we're describing, a medic basically coming 0:04:58.640 --> 0:05:02.400 out and stabbing up football player with a syringe full 0:05:02.400 --> 0:05:04.880 of morphine sounds more like something akin to what you'd 0:05:04.920 --> 0:05:07.400 see on a Vietnam battlefield, you know, I mean, this 0:05:07.560 --> 0:05:11.480 is this is a college sport for fun. 0:05:12.040 --> 0:05:17.280 Right right, He was not wearing headgear. Today, football is 0:05:17.320 --> 0:05:21.400 still hazardous. According to CDC estimates here in the US, 0:05:21.760 --> 0:05:24.919 one point six to three point eight million sports and 0:05:25.080 --> 0:05:29.960 recreation related concussions occur each year in the US. Ten 0:05:30.040 --> 0:05:35.120 percent of all contact sports athletes sustain concussions each year. 0:05:35.680 --> 0:05:40.120 Brain injuries cause more deaths than any other sport injury, 0:05:40.200 --> 0:05:44.520 and in American football, brain injuries count forget this, sixty 0:05:44.680 --> 0:05:49.080 five to ninety five percent of all fatalities. And this 0:05:49.160 --> 0:05:51.440 is with all the equipment that people have today. 0:05:51.640 --> 0:05:53.880 Yeah, back in these days that we're talking about, they 0:05:54.080 --> 0:05:56.479 didn't have helmets, they barely had any padding. 0:05:57.240 --> 0:05:59.000 A little later, there's a movie. 0:05:59.040 --> 0:06:02.080 Called leather Head that starts a guy played gym in 0:06:02.120 --> 0:06:04.599 the office in George Cleaney, where you can see the 0:06:04.720 --> 0:06:08.239 relatively minor changes that were made in football by nineteen 0:06:08.320 --> 0:06:10.680 twenty five, and there were some pretty small helmets, a 0:06:10.680 --> 0:06:13.400 little bit more shoulder padding. But in these days, when 0:06:13.440 --> 0:06:16.440 this event, this death of this young man, really polarized 0:06:16.480 --> 0:06:20.000 the nation against the sport, very little protective measures were 0:06:20.040 --> 0:06:22.599 put in place for these young men that were out there. 0:06:22.960 --> 0:06:26.839 I am delighted because we know a lot about each other. 0:06:26.960 --> 0:06:29.520 This is news to me, folks. I am delighted, Noel, 0:06:30.760 --> 0:06:36.200 by your fascination with these these like turn of the 0:06:36.279 --> 0:06:41.160 twentieth century football films, you know, nineties to early two 0:06:41.200 --> 0:06:43.000 thousands is at your wheelhouse. 0:06:42.520 --> 0:06:45.920 Totally, Dude, did my dissertation on varsity blues. 0:06:46.400 --> 0:06:49.159 You know, looking back at all makes sense in retrospect, 0:06:49.760 --> 0:06:54.599 and that's something that we see today. You know, if 0:06:54.600 --> 0:06:58.440 you've ever watched a US football game, you can see 0:06:58.440 --> 0:07:01.440 the tremendous amount of damage these folks are dealing out 0:07:01.480 --> 0:07:03.320 to one another, and then you can look back at 0:07:03.400 --> 0:07:08.839 pictures of footballers of yesteryear and see that they were 0:07:08.880 --> 0:07:13.120 doing the same thing with much less protection. This has 0:07:13.200 --> 0:07:18.480 been an ongoing debate in this country. Was football a 0:07:18.600 --> 0:07:22.120 proper pastime, people were asking in the wake of Von 0:07:22.240 --> 0:07:26.600 Gammon's death, or was it as violent and deadly as 0:07:26.680 --> 0:07:32.560 quote the gladiatorial combat of ancient Rome Ivy League. University 0:07:32.640 --> 0:07:39.480 presidents argued about this, along with reformists, muckraking, journalists, and politicians. 0:07:39.760 --> 0:07:43.840 As we learn through a great Smithsonian article called score 0:07:43.880 --> 0:07:50.320 one for Roosevelt. President Theodore Roosevelt himself intervened because you see, 0:07:50.400 --> 0:07:53.560 in addition to being president, he was a huge football fan. 0:07:53.800 --> 0:07:56.480 It had been from the start. And he even schooled 0:07:56.680 --> 0:08:00.360 his young son who comes into play in this and 0:08:00.480 --> 0:08:03.640 saying that the very thing that makes us love football 0:08:03.960 --> 0:08:07.080 is the very thing that makes it so utterly brutal 0:08:07.160 --> 0:08:10.880 and dangerous at the time. I'm not a football Okay, 0:08:11.040 --> 0:08:13.680 now I'm showing I'm tipping my hand a little bit. 0:08:13.760 --> 0:08:15.840 I am not an expert on the sport itself, just 0:08:15.880 --> 0:08:17.960 more it's portrayal in cinema. 0:08:18.280 --> 0:08:21.880 But they didn't even have the forward pass. It was 0:08:21.920 --> 0:08:22.920 all about the rush. 0:08:23.080 --> 0:08:26.160 It was all about having an individual holding the ball 0:08:26.480 --> 0:08:29.400 rushing it physically, not throwing the ball and having it 0:08:29.440 --> 0:08:31.960 intercept it. You had to actually physically hold it, and 0:08:32.000 --> 0:08:35.560 that would open you up to much more potential to 0:08:35.679 --> 0:08:38.160 be hit or dogpiled on. And that is how the 0:08:38.160 --> 0:08:39.640 game was played in those days. 0:08:39.880 --> 0:08:45.160 And this put Roosevelt in an interesting position because he 0:08:45.400 --> 0:08:49.000 loved the game ever since he was a kid. He 0:08:49.240 --> 0:08:52.280 publicly presented himself as a fan, but there was a 0:08:52.320 --> 0:08:55.160 little bit of what pr folks would call optics to 0:08:55.240 --> 0:09:00.360 play here, because this bravado in his public presentation of 0:09:00.400 --> 0:09:04.520 himself was meant to distract from his severe asthma, his 0:09:04.679 --> 0:09:07.600 terrible eyesight, and the other physical challenges he had growing 0:09:07.679 --> 0:09:10.640 up as a sickly child. He was too slender and 0:09:10.720 --> 0:09:14.760 frail to play varsity football himself, but that did not 0:09:14.960 --> 0:09:18.520 diminish his love for the sport. Roosevelt called American football 0:09:18.880 --> 0:09:23.920 the greatest exercise of fine moral qualities such as resolution, courage, endurance, 0:09:24.000 --> 0:09:27.800 and capacity to hold one's own and stand up under punishment. 0:09:28.320 --> 0:09:31.200 He also wrote that in life, as in a football game, 0:09:31.440 --> 0:09:34.360 the principle should be don't foul and don't shirk, but 0:09:34.480 --> 0:09:38.920 hit the line hard. Furthermore, he said, I will disinherit 0:09:39.240 --> 0:09:42.240 ady son who does not play college sports. 0:09:42.320 --> 0:09:44.160 Yeah, and this comes into play in just a little bit. 0:09:44.200 --> 0:09:46.000 But he also was quoted as saying in a public 0:09:46.000 --> 0:09:48.800 address in nineteen oh three that he didn't feel any 0:09:48.840 --> 0:09:52.120 sympathy for people who got battered, even a great deal, 0:09:52.400 --> 0:09:55.800 as long as it was not fatal. And the thing is, 0:09:56.000 --> 0:10:00.480 these injuries that were happening, they didn't always result and death, 0:10:00.600 --> 0:10:05.880 but they were gruesome and they had long lasting ramifications, 0:10:05.920 --> 0:10:08.360 even if it wasn't clear right away. It was this 0:10:08.679 --> 0:10:13.040 death in clear view of everyone basically that really changed 0:10:13.040 --> 0:10:17.000 the conversation. But we are talking about punctured lungs from 0:10:17.240 --> 0:10:20.479 ribs that are broken, We are talking about head injuries. 0:10:20.720 --> 0:10:25.280 We are talking about wrenched spines, broken legs, all kinds 0:10:25.280 --> 0:10:29.040 of stuff because of the lack of safeguards in this sport. 0:10:29.400 --> 0:10:29.600 Right. 0:10:29.679 --> 0:10:32.360 And we also have to consider that at this point 0:10:32.400 --> 0:10:36.360 in time, a lot of people were not aware of 0:10:36.400 --> 0:10:41.360 the long term damage posed by concussions, you know what 0:10:41.440 --> 0:10:46.800 I mean. They wouldn't notice something wrong necessarily until several 0:10:47.280 --> 0:10:55.319 years had passed. Historians will tell us that by the 0:10:55.360 --> 0:10:58.360 time Roosevelt entered the White House as president in nineteen 0:10:58.400 --> 0:11:03.000 oh one, the grid iron had turned into a killing 0:11:03.080 --> 0:11:09.360 field because of these harsh rules. One Princeton player explained 0:11:09.400 --> 0:11:13.640 to the journalist Henry Beach need him that we're coach 0:11:13.800 --> 0:11:16.120 to pick out the most dangerous man on the opposing 0:11:16.200 --> 0:11:18.840 side and put him out in the first five minutes 0:11:19.080 --> 0:11:19.880 of the game. 0:11:20.240 --> 0:11:21.080 In nineteen oh. 0:11:20.960 --> 0:11:25.520 Five, the Chicago Tribune reported that nineteen people died playing college, 0:11:25.600 --> 0:11:31.079 high school, and sandlot amateur football that year, and Roosevelt 0:11:31.160 --> 0:11:34.719 was getting unsettled. He didn't like this. He's president, so 0:11:34.920 --> 0:11:37.200 the press is always going to be, you know, at 0:11:37.280 --> 0:11:41.360 least partially adversarial, right, And being a shrewd politician, he 0:11:41.559 --> 0:11:46.920 saw trouble on the horizon, and he didn't like these 0:11:47.280 --> 0:11:53.199 journalists talking bad, talking smack about football. He was determined 0:11:53.240 --> 0:11:56.480 to save football somehow. He also knew on the on 0:11:56.520 --> 0:12:00.560 the side of the Ivory Towers that several officials at 0:12:00.559 --> 0:12:06.199 Harvard and other universities were determined to abolish the game altogether, 0:12:06.200 --> 0:12:09.280 at least ban it from their campuses. Roosevelt referred to 0:12:09.320 --> 0:12:12.480 this as the Baby Act. In that period that Ben 0:12:12.520 --> 0:12:13.560 you were just describing. 0:12:13.679 --> 0:12:16.760 In the nineteen oh five football season, the Chicago Tribune 0:12:16.840 --> 0:12:18.720 coined a pretty excellent expression for it. 0:12:19.080 --> 0:12:22.719 They called it the death Harvest. Yeah. 0:12:23.080 --> 0:12:26.160 Yeah, So we see Roosevelt at a crossroads, right, the 0:12:26.360 --> 0:12:31.959 colleges want to end the game, the journalists are describing 0:12:32.280 --> 0:12:37.480 the horrors of physical injury in lurid detail. Maybe now 0:12:38.040 --> 0:12:41.920 we reintroduce his son, Theodore Roosevelt Junior. 0:12:42.200 --> 0:12:45.360 It was in that year of the Death Harvest that 0:12:45.920 --> 0:12:50.040 Ted Roosevelt, as Theodore Roosevelt Junior was known, was playing 0:12:50.600 --> 0:12:55.000 for his alma mater of Harvard against Yale, and that 0:12:55.200 --> 0:12:58.760 was when he got an illegal hit that left him 0:12:58.800 --> 0:13:02.400 with a broken nose and a pretty bloodied face, and 0:13:02.600 --> 0:13:06.640 some conjecture that they this was done to him on 0:13:06.679 --> 0:13:09.559 purpose because no one else had been seriously injured in 0:13:09.880 --> 0:13:10.600 that game. 0:13:12.400 --> 0:13:13.880 And in that But here's the thing. 0:13:14.240 --> 0:13:17.400 In that same afternoon, another football player by the name 0:13:17.400 --> 0:13:19.960 of Harold Moore, who played for a Union college, he 0:13:20.240 --> 0:13:23.720 died of a cerebral hemorrhage when he was kicked in 0:13:23.880 --> 0:13:29.480 the head while attempting to tackle an NYU player. And 0:13:29.640 --> 0:13:33.400 this was all during that year, and it was kind 0:13:33.440 --> 0:13:36.920 of an eye opening thing for President Roosevelt because he 0:13:37.040 --> 0:13:39.920 wasn't he certainly didn't want to give his son special treatment, 0:13:40.320 --> 0:13:43.719 But I think it opened his eyes to how there 0:13:43.760 --> 0:13:46.280 needed to be some kind of change that wouldn't rob 0:13:46.360 --> 0:13:49.560 the sport of what made it good, but also would 0:13:49.880 --> 0:13:52.240 have some protections for these young men who were in 0:13:52.320 --> 0:13:55.280 Ivy League schools and had bright careers ahead of them 0:13:55.280 --> 0:13:56.320 outside of the sport. 0:13:56.520 --> 0:13:57.320 You know, they didn't want to. 0:13:57.280 --> 0:13:59.280 He didn't want them to have like brain injuries and 0:13:59.480 --> 0:14:03.000 be so seriously injured that they couldn't pursue their dreams. 0:14:03.040 --> 0:14:04.720 I mean, I think, what do you think made it 0:14:04.800 --> 0:14:07.240 click for him Ben, Because he certainly didn't seem someone 0:14:07.280 --> 0:14:10.240 that would pamper his son. He wanted him to, you know, 0:14:10.320 --> 0:14:12.520 be in this rough environment and kind of learn and 0:14:12.640 --> 0:14:14.199 you know, stand on his own two feet. 0:14:14.520 --> 0:14:17.920 There are multiple factors. We know that he was very 0:14:18.040 --> 0:14:22.040 very close to his children, but he also expected a 0:14:22.160 --> 0:14:25.640 lot out of them. We know that he wrote to 0:14:25.680 --> 0:14:28.880 his son and said that the very things that make 0:14:28.960 --> 0:14:31.640 it a good game make it a rough game, referring 0:14:31.680 --> 0:14:36.120 to football, and even then he seemed a little divided. 0:14:36.160 --> 0:14:39.120 He definitely wanted his children to play, but he was 0:14:39.160 --> 0:14:43.120 also as any father would be, concerned. And then you know, 0:14:43.160 --> 0:14:45.880 you have the media angle, and then you have the 0:14:46.080 --> 0:14:52.680 inarguable fact that children are dying. They're dying preventable deaths, 0:14:53.480 --> 0:14:58.480 and they're dying as a result of participating in this sport. 0:14:59.000 --> 0:15:03.760 On October, Roosevelt convenes a football summit at the White House. 0:15:04.240 --> 0:15:07.800 A lot of people are there, athletic directors, IVY League coaches, 0:15:08.160 --> 0:15:13.400 Secretary of State Elihu Root and Roosevelt says football is 0:15:13.480 --> 0:15:17.000 on trial because I believe in the game. I want 0:15:17.040 --> 0:15:19.480 to do all I can to save it. And so 0:15:19.560 --> 0:15:22.040 I have called you all down here to see whether 0:15:22.120 --> 0:15:24.600 you won't all agree to abide by both the letter 0:15:24.920 --> 0:15:27.840 and spirit of the rules, for that will help. 0:15:28.040 --> 0:15:31.000 And Ben, if I'm not mistaken, this summit, or this 0:15:31.200 --> 0:15:36.680 intercollegiate collective a conference, I guess would ultimately become what 0:15:36.840 --> 0:15:38.720 is now today known as the NC Double A. 0:15:39.120 --> 0:15:44.160 Yeah, the National Collegiate Athletic Association. This happens. So he 0:15:44.240 --> 0:15:47.120 makes this speech on nineteen oh five, same year as 0:15:47.160 --> 0:15:50.560 the death Harvest. The next year, March nineteen oh six, 0:15:50.800 --> 0:15:56.080 sixty two institutions become members of the NC DOUBLEA. And 0:15:56.160 --> 0:16:00.240 this included a codified set of rules. I've engaged meant 0:16:00.320 --> 0:16:03.680 much like any kind of international agreement between Nations on 0:16:03.720 --> 0:16:07.840 what constitutes fair war tactics. I mean, this was very 0:16:07.920 --> 0:16:10.720 much along those lines. They changed some of the rules. 0:16:10.720 --> 0:16:12.680 Remember earlier I was talking about how they didn't allow 0:16:12.760 --> 0:16:14.800 the forward pass. You had to run with the ball. 0:16:15.120 --> 0:16:18.160 Now they allowed the forward pass, which would cut down 0:16:18.280 --> 0:16:22.720 on the opportunities for runners to be tackled. And not 0:16:22.840 --> 0:16:24.880 to mention, they changed some more specific things. Then you 0:16:24.960 --> 0:16:27.000 might have a better grasp of this than me. I'm 0:16:27.000 --> 0:16:29.840 going to do my best to explain it. They changed 0:16:30.160 --> 0:16:33.920 they had a neutral zone between offense and defense, and 0:16:34.120 --> 0:16:36.960 they actually so a neutral zone would be a zone 0:16:37.000 --> 0:16:40.840 where you are less likely to get hit? 0:16:41.000 --> 0:16:41.960 Is that right? So? 0:16:42.120 --> 0:16:45.040 In American football, and I had to look this up. 0:16:45.640 --> 0:16:49.280 In American football, the neutral zone is the length of 0:16:49.320 --> 0:16:51.960 the football from one tip to the other when it 0:16:52.080 --> 0:16:55.480 spotted placed on a certain spot on the field prior 0:16:55.520 --> 0:16:58.200 to the snap of the ball during a scrimmage down. 0:16:59.000 --> 0:17:03.880 Okay, so there's that again. I feel like you just 0:17:03.920 --> 0:17:06.320 got woshed. I gotshed. They got wished big time. So 0:17:06.400 --> 0:17:08.360 legalize the forward pass. That one I understand. 0:17:08.920 --> 0:17:12.439 Neutral zone, and then they also doubled the This is 0:17:12.440 --> 0:17:14.879 from a history dot com article about how Teddy Roosevelt 0:17:14.920 --> 0:17:20.160 saved football. They doubled the first down distance to ten yards, 0:17:21.200 --> 0:17:25.440 so I guess you didn't have to rush quite as far. Oh, 0:17:25.600 --> 0:17:26.960 you know what, in the amount of time. 0:17:27.160 --> 0:17:30.800 That makes sense. Also, I was getting two in the weeds. 0:17:30.800 --> 0:17:33.600 With that neutral zone definition. Let's just think of it 0:17:33.640 --> 0:17:36.480 as an area where no members of either team can 0:17:36.520 --> 0:17:38.720 go other than the person holding the ball. 0:17:39.320 --> 0:17:39.920 That makes sense. 0:17:40.000 --> 0:17:42.640 That makes a little more sense. We're unwooshing ourselves big time. 0:17:47.240 --> 0:17:49.360 And this didn't completely change the nature of the game, 0:17:49.359 --> 0:17:51.879 which was by design. They wanted to keep it rough. 0:17:52.040 --> 0:17:53.760 They didn't want to like I mean, it's a little 0:17:53.760 --> 0:17:55.359 bit of a pejorative, I mean very much as but 0:17:55.560 --> 0:17:58.040 Roosevelt said, they didn't want to make the game be 0:17:58.160 --> 0:18:01.600 played quote on two ladies like a basis. So it 0:18:01.640 --> 0:18:04.639 certainly wasn't become It certainly wasn't becoming touch football or 0:18:04.680 --> 0:18:10.080 flag football or something. But fatalities declined to eleven per 0:18:10.160 --> 0:18:12.600 year instead of the nineteen that we saw in that 0:18:12.680 --> 0:18:13.960 death harvest year, which. 0:18:13.920 --> 0:18:16.280 To me isn't quite good enough. 0:18:16.400 --> 0:18:20.240 Still progress, I guess you could say that Harvard's football 0:18:20.280 --> 0:18:23.600 coach at the time, William Reid, said that Roosevelt had 0:18:23.640 --> 0:18:28.080 helped save the game. A ban against the sport by 0:18:28.080 --> 0:18:32.280 colleges and universities would have prevented most likely would have 0:18:32.320 --> 0:18:38.000 prevented the development of professional football. And although this ends 0:18:38.040 --> 0:18:40.879 the main branch of our tail, and it is true 0:18:40.920 --> 0:18:44.560 that if you are a football fan, you should ardently 0:18:44.720 --> 0:18:49.239 thank President Theodore Roosevelt. I have to say there is 0:18:49.440 --> 0:18:52.920 one thing about football that always trips me out. More 0:18:52.960 --> 0:18:57.120 and more recently, it's the Super Bowl halftime show. Man, Yeah, 0:18:57.400 --> 0:18:59.840 which is its own bag of Badgers, its own ball 0:19:00.080 --> 0:19:04.240 wax or weird string, or just a ball of lip 0:19:04.280 --> 0:19:06.600 sync abbreviated performances totally. 0:19:06.680 --> 0:19:08.920 We have these Super Bowl in Atlanta this last game, 0:19:09.200 --> 0:19:11.720 and people were talking more about the halftime show than 0:19:11.720 --> 0:19:13.639 they were about the game. Apparently it was a bit 0:19:13.640 --> 0:19:15.679 of a snooze fest. But it was funny when there 0:19:15.720 --> 0:19:18.160 were things that happened as part of the game the telecast, 0:19:18.359 --> 0:19:20.720 I could go outside and hear like the Blue Angel 0:19:20.760 --> 0:19:22.879 Jets flying overhead. That was funny to be able to 0:19:23.000 --> 0:19:24.520 experience those things in real time. 0:19:25.359 --> 0:19:29.919 Yeah, you know, I know that there are amazing Super 0:19:29.960 --> 0:19:34.040 Bowl halftime performances, and I know that there are people 0:19:34.040 --> 0:19:36.800 who just tune in to watch that, But I gotta 0:19:36.840 --> 0:19:40.280 say I the last one didn't really didn't really move me, 0:19:40.560 --> 0:19:41.240 you know what I mean? 0:19:41.560 --> 0:19:42.720 Who was that Maroon five? 0:19:42.960 --> 0:19:45.520 Maroon five Adam Levine with his Adam Levine and his 0:19:45.600 --> 0:19:46.480 TACKI tattoos. 0:19:47.359 --> 0:19:50.119 I heard the bigger controversy was him showing a nipple 0:19:50.320 --> 0:19:52.680 and not getting nipples and not getting in trouble with 0:19:52.880 --> 0:19:55.720 multiple multiple nipples, yeah, for just the one. 0:19:56.200 --> 0:19:58.600 Yeah, it's definitely a bizarre double standard. 0:19:58.880 --> 0:20:02.960 So let us know what you think of American football. 0:20:03.000 --> 0:20:06.760 I'd especially love to hear what you think if you 0:20:07.000 --> 0:20:10.679 are not from this country, because here in the US 0:20:11.119 --> 0:20:17.200 football is tremendously popular. It's a billion dollar industry, and 0:20:17.320 --> 0:20:20.920 for outsiders looking in, the rules of football can seem 0:20:21.000 --> 0:20:24.080 as inscrutable as the rules of cricket. 0:20:24.359 --> 0:20:26.880 Do you know the rules of cricket? Absolutely not. Don't 0:20:27.119 --> 0:20:28.480 bad neither do I. 0:20:27.960 --> 0:20:32.639 I know the bat's called the wicket right No? 0:20:32.640 --> 0:20:37.520 No, sorry man, No, no, it's I don't know the 0:20:37.600 --> 0:20:40.640 name of the bat in cricket, but the wicket is 0:20:40.840 --> 0:20:44.240 one of the two sets of three stumps at either 0:20:44.359 --> 0:20:47.359 end of the pitch, like no, like a wicket in croquete. 0:20:47.920 --> 0:20:49.080 So what's a sticky wicket. 0:20:50.200 --> 0:20:54.439 Sticky wicket. If I'm just speculating, here is a wicket 0:20:54.520 --> 0:20:59.720 where it's tough to knock down the horizontal parts the bales. 0:21:00.000 --> 0:21:03.080 Okay, I give up, don't give all right, I won't 0:21:03.080 --> 0:21:03.959 give up. I'll send you. 0:21:04.000 --> 0:21:06.600 I'm gonna send you a great sketch from Mitchell and 0:21:06.680 --> 0:21:09.240 Webb by friends about cricket. 0:21:09.359 --> 0:21:11.200 I would really love that, Ben, because I love mitchellin 0:21:11.280 --> 0:21:14.240 Webb and I apparently am completely ignorant on the rules 0:21:14.280 --> 0:21:16.560 of cricket and American football because you know what, Ben, 0:21:16.680 --> 0:21:18.719 they don't really talked about the rules in the movies, 0:21:18.760 --> 0:21:19.679 the football movies. 0:21:19.800 --> 0:21:22.080 They just assume that you already know. And it's mainly 0:21:22.119 --> 0:21:24.120 about the Oscar moment. Speeches right to. 0:21:24.080 --> 0:21:26.080 Me, it's about the Oscar moment. It's about it's about 0:21:26.080 --> 0:21:28.399 like Rudy is a good one. I like Rudy, you know, 0:21:28.520 --> 0:21:31.199 the underdog story. I really like at mainstream for you. 0:21:31.520 --> 0:21:34.040 I know, I know, I usually go for the deeper cuts, 0:21:34.080 --> 0:21:35.920 but it's it's an important one. 0:21:36.000 --> 0:21:39.040 Remember the Titans, do you remember them? Remember those Titans? 0:21:39.520 --> 0:21:42.200 I don't remember those Titans. I know the name of 0:21:42.240 --> 0:21:43.960 the film, but I haven't watched it. 0:21:43.960 --> 0:21:48.520 It's a very very inspiring tale of underdoggedness. 0:21:48.960 --> 0:21:54.280 I'm more into weird presidential history and trivia, and I 0:21:54.320 --> 0:21:56.320 think this episode qualifies for that. 0:21:56.640 --> 0:21:59.920 I think this episode is the beautiful ven diagram between 0:22:00.200 --> 0:22:01.200 those two disciplines. 0:22:01.280 --> 0:22:02.360 Ben right, right. 0:22:02.400 --> 0:22:07.200 I agree with you, Noel, and this ends our story today. Yeah, 0:22:07.320 --> 0:22:12.000 let us know if American football is popular outside of 0:22:12.359 --> 0:22:16.560 the US, it's probably never going to be as popular 0:22:16.640 --> 0:22:19.119 as soccer or you know what the rest of the 0:22:19.119 --> 0:22:23.560 world calls football. Furthermore, let us know what you think 0:22:23.680 --> 0:22:28.280 of the concussion controversy. A few years back, we got 0:22:28.320 --> 0:22:31.399 together at work and did what I think is a 0:22:31.440 --> 0:22:36.200 pretty stand up video, a documentary on concussions. 0:22:36.200 --> 0:22:37.760 Do you remember that, Casey. 0:22:37.400 --> 0:22:39.800 I do remember that we went to or I didn't go, 0:22:39.880 --> 0:22:44.040 but somebody went to like a conference or something about it, right, Yeah, yeah, 0:22:44.040 --> 0:22:45.639 Football Hall of Fame or something like that. 0:22:46.760 --> 0:22:52.320 Maybe we can post that on our Facebook page, Ridiculous Historians. 0:22:52.119 --> 0:22:54.600 It's an excellent way to learn a little bit more 0:22:54.680 --> 0:23:00.560 about the current science combating concussions today. While you are 0:23:00.560 --> 0:23:03.360 on the internet, feel free to check us out on Twitter. 0:23:03.520 --> 0:23:07.560 You can also find us on Instagram, and you can 0:23:07.880 --> 0:23:12.480 check out some more of knowles. I'm a certain deep 0:23:12.600 --> 0:23:17.920 dive research into nineties era football films on his own Instagram. 0:23:18.000 --> 0:23:20.879