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NO MEMBER OF '13 EVER DEFEATED BY YALE IN FOOTBALL

(Reprinted from 1913 Class Album)

By Percy LANGDON Wendell

Never has a Harvard football team on which a member of the Class of 1913 was eligible to play been beaten by Yale.

In our Freshman year we inflicted on Yale a severe defeat of 12-0. On the Friday before the game the class marched to the field with a band and sang and cheered, which put the finishing touches on the team. Saturday was a perfect day for a game. "Dick" Lewis led the team onto the field and soon the game began. After the kick-off it was nip and tuck for a while, but we soon were under way and carried the ball from our own forty-yard line for a touchdown. After we had scored once, the game was ours despite the cries of "Now for dear old Yale." We scored again in the second half, and the game ended with the ball on Yale's one-yard line.

Too much credit cannot be given to "Gren" Waterbury for the way he developed the team; and the assistant coaches, Potter, Dewey, and More, are also to be paid homage. The men who won their numerals were M. Carr, G. C. Cutler, Jr., Gilpin Ervin, S. M. Felton, L. Godfrey, H. B. Gardner, E. A. Graustein, A. M. Goodale, P. M. Hollister, G. G. Jones, R. P. Lewis, Captain; E. Lingard, B. Marsh, D. C. Parmenter, J. S. Parker, F. Parker, P. L. Wendell, and O. Wolcott, Manager.

In our Sophomore year we went to New Haven to see Lothrop Withington's team play. The team went to New Haven with the entire confidence of the undergraduate body, and from the records of the Harvard and Yale teams every indication pointed to a Harvard victory. Up to this time our season had been very successful, while Yale had suffered two defeats, one by West Point and the other by Brown. However, Harvard was unable to win, the game resulting in a scoreless tie, which under the circumstances seemed almost impossible. Harvard showed herself to be stronger, but could not get the ball over the line.

The football team of 1911 also started out with brilliant prospects. "Bob" Fisher was Captain, and in him the team had all the confidence in the world. This year Harvard was to play Prince- ton for the first time since 1896, and the game was to be played three weeks before the Yale game. The early games went by quickly and were won by safe margins. It seemed but a day before the team left for Princeton.

This was a very disastrous game, Harvard being beaten 8-6. The game was lost by our own mistakes and won by Princeton's taking advantage of them; but had we not lost so many men by injury I believe Harvard would have won. In the first place, all our kickers were on the injured list, and this meant that Campbell, the little halfback, had to kick, though he had never before kicked in a game. Gardiner, the tackle, broke his arm in the first five minutes, then Potter wrenched his knee, an a little later Gardner at quarterback was hit in the head. Harvard was a crippled and defeated team. When this team met Yale a few weeks later, there had been all kinds of changes made. It was a manufactured team. How, we did as well as we did against Yale I do not know, but we did make a good showing and proved ourselves to be strong and powerful.

The season of 1912 was as successful a season as Harvard had ever had. In the first week of practice there was a cry from the coaches for larger men. But larger could not be found, and so the coaches made the most of it. The men were light; all of them, practically. When some of the old players came out to coach, the men looked ridiculously small. With such light men playing a hard schedule it was greatly feared that they could not stand the strain. But all went well. There was a steady development in the team and in the individuals; all were striving for perfection. A bond of sympathy arose between the players that is impossible to explain.

The Princeton game soon came. It is not necessary for me to tell of the game. They scored first on a long forward pass which served to start the Harvard team going. Brickley soon kicked a goal from the field, and it was not long before we scored a touchdown. We beat them decidedly and decisively. The team came out of the game without an injury and having had experience and having gained confidence in itself.

And now why should I write of the Yale game? Does it have to be recalled to your mind how afraid all were that Harvard would not win. A better team, perhaps, but they never seem to be able to beat Yale! And how after the kick-off we exchanged kicks with Yale for awhile and then how they fumbled and Storer recovered the ball for a touchdown? And how we got two goals from the field and were able again by a perfectly executed play to carry the ball over the goal line? Again how in the last quarter Yale tried the much-heralded Minnesota shift and were able to carry the ball to our ten-yard line? And how in the last few minutes, as Yale was going to try a goal from the field, they became confused and were unable to get it off before time was called? And then the glorious times that followed--but these are too numerous to write about.

The man to be thanked for all this is, as you know, Mr. Percy Haughton. He is the one who has put Harvard football on its feet. The class will always recognize this and will always feel confidence in him

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