Football was first introduced to Menasha High School in 1895 but it was mostly an intramural affair and died a quick, unheralded death. In 1898, the team pictured above was organized until Nick Wagner broke his collar bone. As a result, interest again waned until 1902. This was no surprise as football at the turn of the century was a violent affair. Little protection for players, illegal forward passes, and a five yards per down system made the game a grinding, bone-crunching free-for-all. Typical formations consisted of players locking arms in wedge formations to protect their ball carriers while using their bare heads as battering rams against the defense.
The general consensus among Americans was that the game should be banned. The newspapers were filled every season with sad obituaries of young men, who succumbed to skull fractures, fractured ribs piercing organs, and twisted spinal cords from the violent game. President Theodore Roosevelt is largely credited with saving football in 1905 by calling meetings at the White House with various college officials to revamp the game. These men were the forerunner for the NCAA. They legalized the forward pass, abolished the dangerous mass formations, created a neutral zone between offense and defense and doubled the first-down distance to 10 yards, to be gained in three downs. The rule changes didn’t eliminate football’s dangers, but fatalities declined—to 11 per year in both 1906 and 1907—while injuries fell sharply. An increase in fatalities in 1909 led to another round of reforms that further eased restrictions on the forward pass and formed the foundation of the modern sport as we know it today.
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