October 7, 1922: Ohio Stadium Opens

October 7, 1922: Ohio Stadium opens in Columbus. Ohio State University had outgrown the 14,000-seat Ohio Field, but people laughed when they built a 66,210-seat stadium. They got over 71,000 fans for the opening game, a 5-0 win over Ohio Wesleyan.

NOTE: New York University, oddly, also played football at a facility named Ohio Field, from 1901 until they dropped their program after the 1952 season.

Seating capacity was raised to 78,000 in 1948, 81,000 in 1962, 83,000 in 1974, 85,000 in 1982, 91,000 in 1991, and it broke the 100,000-seat barrier in 2001. Officially, since 2019, the seating capacity of what ABC Sports college football master Keith Jackson labeled "The Big Horseshoe on the Olentangy" has been 102,780, but they've topped out at 110,045, in their 2016 win over arch-rival Michigan. The field was switched to AstroTurf in 1971, back to natural grass in 1990, and to FieldTurf in 2007.

Since moving in, the Buckeyes have won 34 Big Ten Conference Championships, and claim 8 National Championships: 1942, under head coach Paul Brown; 1954, 1957, 1961, 1968 and 1970, under Woody Hayes; 2002, under Jim Tressel; and 2014, under Urban Meyer. Ohio Stadium has been home to 6 Heisman Trophy winners, including Archie Griffin in 1974 and 1975, the only 2-time winner. The others have been Les Horvath in 1944, Vic Janowicz in 1950, Howard Cassady in 1955, Eddie George in 1995, and Troy Smith in 2006. Smith was a quarterback, the rest were running backs.

Ohio Stadium was also home to the Ohio Glory of the World League of American Football (WLAF) in 1992, and to the Columbus Crew of Major League Soccer from their 1996 founding until 1998. The Columbus Bullies, winners of the only titles in the 1940 and 1941 edition of the American Football League, played at Red Bird Stadium, later Cooper Stadium, the city's minor-league ballpark from 1931 to 2008.

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October 7, 1922 was a Saturday. These other notable college football games were played:

* Army beat Kansas, 13-0 on The Plain in West Point, New York.

* Navy beat Western Reserve, 71-0 at Worden Field in Annapolis, Maryland.

* Columbia beat Amherst, 43-6 at South Field in Upper Manhattan.

* Rutgers beat Fordham, 20-15 at Neilson Field in New Brunswick, New Jersey.

* Princeton beat Virginia, 5-0 at Palmer Stadium in Princeton, New Jersey.

* Syracuse beat New York University (NYU), 34-0 at Archbold Stadium in Syracuse, New York.

* Harvard beat Holy Cross, 20-0 at Harvard Stadium in Boston.

* Yale beat North Carolina, 18-0 at the Yale Bowl in New Haven, Connecticut.

* Alabama beat Oglethorpe, 41-0 at Denny Field in Tuscaloosa, Alabama.

* Notre Dame beat Saint Louis University, 26-0 at Cartier Field in South Bend, Indiana.

* Michigan beat Case -- an Ohio school, if not Ohio State -- 48-0 at Ferry Field in Ann Arbor, Michigan. In 1970, Case and Western Reserve merged, forming Case Western Reserve University.

* The University of Chicago beat the University of Georgia, 20-0 at Stagg Field in Chicago.

There was also a World Series game played. With the questionable calling of Game 2 due to "darkness" in mind, Commissioner Kenesaw Mountain Landis insists that Game 4 be played, despite a heavy rain. Again, one big inning, a 4-run 4th off Yankee pitcher Carl Mays, is enough for Hugh McQuillan of the Giants to squeeze out a 4-3 win. Aaron Ward's 2nd homer of the Series is all the long-ball clout the Yankees will display.

Mays' brief collapse today‚ coupled with his 2 losses in the 1921 Series‚ and with the 1919 Series still fresh in fans' memories, leads to rumors that he took money to throw the games. The accusations will persist for decades. As with the claim that his pitch that killed Ray Chapman of Cleveland in 1920 was on purpose, Mays goes to his grave in 1971 insisting that it wasn't true.

Also on this day, Grady Edgebert Hatton Jr. is born in Beaumont, Texas. A 3rd baseman, he played from 1946 to 1960, mostly for the Cincinnati Reds, and was an All-Star in 1952. He later managed the Houston Astros from 1966 to 1968, remained with them as a scout and a coach, and died in 2013.

Also on this day, for the 1st time, a member of the British royal family speaks during a radio broadcast. It is Edward Albert Christian George Andrew Patrick David, Prince of Wales, the heir to the throne. In early 1936, upon the death of his father, King George V, he became King Edward VIII. In late 1936, he used another radio broadcast to to explain his decision to abdicate the throne, and became the Duke of Windsor.