November 9, 1935: The Floyd of Rosedale Trophy

November 9, 1935: One of college football's greatest rivalry trophies has its origin.

Ask longtime fans of the University of Iowa, and they'll say the Hawkeyes' real arch-rival isn't Iowa State, or the University of Nebraska. It's the University of Minnesota. And ask longtime fans of the University of Minnesota, and they'll say the Golden Gophers' real arch-rival isn't the University of Wisconsin, or the University of Michigan. It's the University of Iowa.

The neighboring States' State universities had been playing each other since 1891, and in 1934, things turned nasty over the rough treatment of Ozzie Simmons, a black halfback for Iowa.

The rhetoric got really threatening for the 1935 game, and even the Governors got in on it, with Clyde Herring of Iowa saying the Iowa City crowd wouldn't stand for any rough stuff by the Minnesota players. He got accused of inciting a riot by Minnesota's Attorney General, Harry Peterson. Peterson's boss, Governor Floyd Olson, decided to lighten the mood, with what is, as far as I can tell, the first friendly bet between politicians representing opposing teams: A Minnesota "prize hog" against one from Iowa. Herring took the bet.

The game was played in Iowa City, at Iowa Stadium, renamed Kinnick Stadium in 1972, in memory of Nile Kinnick, Iowa's 1939 Heisman Trophy winner who was killed in a World War II flight training accident in 1943.

There was no incident at the game, either on the field or in the stands. Both teams played cleanly. Simmons walked off the field, receiving handshakes rather than injuries from the Minnesota players. Minnesota won, 13-6, and won their 3rd straight Big Ten Conference Championship, and their 2nd of 3 straight National Championships.

Herring contacted Rosedale Farms outside Fort Dodge, Iowa, and sent the pig to Olson, naming it Floyd of Rosedale, for Olson and the farm. (Had Iowa won, there could have been a trophy named Clyde of Minnetonka.) Olson then commissioned a trophy to be given annually to the winner of the game, because a 98-pound trophy is easier to move than a several-hundred-pound live pig.

Governor Clyde Herring of Iowa (left)

and Governor Floyd Olson of Minnesota,

with the original Floyd of Rosedale, 1935

Herring, a Democrat, was elected to the U.S. Senate in 1936, but lost in 1942, and died in 1945. Olson, a member of the Farmer-Labor Party, a kind of Socialist party that Hubert Humphrey later merged with the State Democratic Party, wasn't so lucky: He was already dying of cancer at the time of the bet, and passed away 9 months later.

Going into their meeting on November 19, 2022, Minnesota lead Iowa, 62-51-2, despite Iowa having won the last 7 games, and 17 of the last 21. Minnesota's lead is partly due to having won the 1st 12 games, from 1891 to 1916. Since the trophy (counting the original pig) was first awarded in 1935, Iowa lead, 43-42.

Iowa also play Iowa State for the Cy-Hawk Trophy (Cyclones vs. Hawkeyes), and Nebraska for the Heroes Trophy. Minnesota also play Wisconsin for Paul Bunyan's Axe, and Michigan for the Little Brown Jug. But both teams would rather win The Pig: Floyd of Rosedale.

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November 9, 1935 was a Saturday. Among the other college football games played that day were these:

* A doubleheader was held at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum. Stanford beat Southern California, 3-0. And Southern Methodist beat UCLA. Stanford won the Pacific Coast Conference title, and SMU the Southwest Conference title. They were on a collision course, and Stanford upset heavily favored SMU in the Rose Bowl on New Year's Day 1936, 7-0. However, Minnesota were awarded the National Championship.

* Tennessee beat Mississippi, 14-13 at Crump Stadium in Memphis. Although the game was in Tennessee's State, the game was much closer to the campus of Ole Miss, 84 miles to 392. This didn't help Ole Miss, though, and the loss cost them the Southeastern Conference title. They did, however, get invited to the Orange Bowl.

* The Catholic University of America, based in Washington, D.C., beat West Virginia Wesleyan, 19-6 at Brookland Stadium in Washington. CUA then beat Ole Miss in the Orange Bowl on New Year's Day. CUA suspended its football program for World War II, and didn't restart it until 1977, at the NCAA Division III level. The 1936 Orange Bowl remains their sports program's greatest moment. West Virginia Wesleyan now compete in NCAA Division II.

* Louisiana State beat Mississippi State, 28-13 at Tiger Stadium in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. LSU won the Southeastern Conference title.

* The night before, Texas Christian University beat Loyola University, 14-0 at Loyola University Stadium in New Orleans. TCU, of Forth Worth, led by quarterback Sammy Baugh, were on a collision course with Dallas arch-rivals SMU for the Southwest Conference title. SMU won, the only loss inflicted upon TCU all season. TCU were invited to the Sugar Bowl, and beat LSU. (The Cotton Bowl didn't start until the next season.)

* Among the service academies, Navy beat Penn, 13-0 at Franklin Field in Philadelphia; but Army lost to the University of Pittsburgh, 29-6 at Pitt Stadium in Pittsburgh.

* New York University beat their arch-rivals, City College of New York, 45-0 at Yankee Stadium. NYU's team included running back Ed Smith, who made money on the side as a male model. He modeled for sculptor Frank Eliscu. It was only when a film crew, making a documentary about the Heisman Trophy for its 50th Anniversary, contacted him that Smith realized that he had been the model for the trophy. He thought he was just posing in his football uniform for a friend who happened to be an artist. The Downtown Athletic Club, caretakers of the Trophy, gave him a copy. He did play in the pros, for the Boston Redskins in 1936 and the Green Bay Packers in 1937.

* Across the Harlem River, at the Polo Grounds, a New York vs. California matchup took place. Fordham and St. Mary's, of Moraga in the East Bay region, played to a 7-7 tie. This game attracted 55,000 fans, while, at Yankee Stadium, NYU vs. CCNY attracted only 6,000.

* And among New Jersey teams, Rutgers beat Boston University, 12-6 at Fenway Park in Boston; and Princeton beat Harvard, 35-0 at Palmer Stadium in Princeton. Princeton went 9-0, but the days when a team in what had recently been unofficially dubbed "the Ivy League" could be awarded the National Championship were over. (It became an official league in 1954.)

Baseball season was over. And the NBA hadn't been founded yet. One NHL game were played that day: The New York Americans and the Toronto Maple Leafs played to a 5-5 tie at Maple Leaf Gardens in Toronto.

And in English soccer, Arsenal and East Midlands side Derby County played to a 1-1 draw at Highbury in North London.

Also, Bob Gibson, the Hall of Fame pitcher for the St. Louis Cardinals, was born on this day.

October 31, 1903: The Little Brown Jug

October 31, 1903: The University of Michigan football team comes to Minneapolis to play the University of Minnesota. Michigan coach Fielding Yost, while a football genius, was a bit paranoid, and thought opposing fans might poison his water. So he sent student manager Thomas B. Roberts to buy something and bring it to him. He went to a local variety store and spent 30 cents on a 5-gallon earthenware jug. The game, at Northrop Field, ended in a 6-6 tie.

Afterward, Minnesota custodian Oscar Munson discovered, in his Scandinavian accent, "Yost left his yug." Supposedly, they contacted Yost and said, "Come and win it back." Michigan didn't even try until 1909, when they did win it back.

Ever since, the jug -- which is not little and not brown -- has been painted maize & blue with Michigan's winning scores on one side, and maroon & gold with Minnesota's winning scores on the other, and gone to the winner. Michigan dominates the rivalry 75-25-3, including the battle for the Little Brown Jug 71-23-2.

This rivalry means little to Michigan, because they have absolutely dominated it. Michigan went 18-2-1 from 1895 to 1932, 14-2-1 from 1943 to 1959, and has gone 44-4 since 1968, including 18 straight from 1987 to 2004. Minnesota won 9 straight from 1934 to 1942.

Henry L. Williams, who had been a star halfback at Yale, coached at Minnesota from 1900 to 1921, winning 8 titles in the league that became the Big Ten Conference, and has been retroactively awarded the 1904 National Championship. He went 136-33-11 at Minnesota, but only 1-5-1 against Michigan. Minnesota's arena, opening in 1928, was named Williams Arena in his honor. He died in 1931.

In contrast, Yost, for whom Michigan's 1923 arena (formerly hosting basketball, and now hockey) was named, coached Michigan from 1901 to 1926, going 165-29-10, including 9-1-1 against Minnesota. He won 10 Conference Championships and 6 National Championships. He died in 1946.

UPDATE: In 2026, the University of Minnesota renamed Williams Arena, nicknamed "The Barn," as "The Barn by Blue Cross and Blue Shield." Other than getting sponsorship money, there was no reason to remove Williams' name: There was no revelation of bigotry or a posthumous sex scandal that would have force the University's hand.

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October 31, 1903 was a Saturday. This was also the day that Hampden Park, Scotland's national stadium, opened in Glasgow. I have a separate entry for that event.

Baseball season was over. Basketball barely existed, and hockey hadn't yet turned professional. These other noteworthy games were played in college football:

* Army beat Vermont, 32-0 on The Plain in West Point, New York.

* Penn State beat Navy, 17-0 at Worden Field in Annapolis, Maryland.

* Yale beat Columbia, 25-0 at the Polo Grounds.

* Harvard beat the Carlisle Indian School, 12-11 at Soldier's Field in Boston. Jim Thorpe was too young to play on the Carlisle varsity, but they almost didn't need him. Two weeks later, on November 14, Harvard Stadium opened, and Harvard lost to Dartmouth. They still play there today.

* The University of Pennsylvania beat Bucknell, 47-6 at Franklin Field in Philadelphia. A new stadium by that name would be built on the same site in 1922.

* Lafayette beat New York University, 8-6 at Ohio Field in The Bronx.

* Princeton beat Cornell, 44-0 at University Field in Princeton, New Jersey.

* And Rutgers beat Stevens Institute, 36-6 at Neilson Field in New Brunswick, New Jersey.

* One game that was meant to be played, but was not, was between Indiana University and Purdue University, on IU's campus in Bloomington. The Purdue Wreck led to its cancellation. I have a separate entry for that event.

October 6, 1923: A Big Day In College Football

Jack Trice

October 6, 1923: It's a big day in college football. The University of Minnesota hosts Iowa State University at Northrop Field in Minneapolis. Iowa State's lone black player, Jack Trice, gets hurt on the 2nd play of the game, breaking his collarbone. He insists he is all right, and stays in the game. But in the 3rd quarter, he tries to tackle a runner, falls, and 3 Minnesota players trample him. He is taken to a hospital, but doctors don't think his life is in danger, and he is released as fit to travel back to Iowa State's campus in Ames. But he has suffered internal bleeding, and dies 2 days later at age 21.

Trice was from the Cleveland area, and in 1979, 56 years after the fact, that city's major paper, The Plain Dealer, investigated his death. A surviving Iowa State teammate, Johnny Behm, said, "One person told me that nothing out of the ordinary happened. But another who saw it said it was murder."

In 1997, Iowa State's home field was named Jack Trice Stadium. It is the only stadium in the NCAA's Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS, formerly known as Division I-A) named for a black person. A statue of him stands outside.

Also on this day, 2 of the classic stadiums of the Big Ten Conference open. Memorial Stadium opens on the campus of the University of Illinois in Champaign. The Fighting Illini beat Nebraska 24-7, and, led by sophomore running back Harold "Red" Grange, go on to win the National Championship.

The stadium's dedication game wouldn't come until the next season, October 18, 1924, when Grange would put on a legendary show in a win over Michigan. The Chicago Bears played their home games at Memorial Stadium in 2002, while the original Soldier Field was torn down and the new one built in its place.

Also on this day, College Field opens on the campus of Michigan State College in East Lansing, but not with a game. The school would be renamed Michigan State University on its Centennial in 1955; the stadium, Macklin Field in 1935, Macklin Stadium in 1948, and Spartan Stadium in 1957. John Macklin was their football coach from 1911 to 1915.

It opened with 14,000 seats. By the time Clarence "Biggie" Munn was coaching the school's 1st great team in the early 1950s, it seated 51,000. When Hugh "Duffy" Daugherty coached its great team of the mid-1960s, it had peaked at 76,000. Today, it seats 75,005. It switched to artificial turf in 1969, and has kept it.

Also on this day, the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum, which had opened on the preceding May 1, hosts a football game for the 1st time. The University of Southern California hosts Pomona College, and wins, 23-7.

The USC Trojans have used the Coliseum as their home field ever since. Their nearby rivals, the University of California at Los Angeles, played home games there from 1933 to 1981. The UCLA Bruins now play home games at the Rose Bowl in Pasadena, which, due to the Trojans' success, has often seemed like a secondary home field to them.

The Coliseum has also been the leading professional football venue in Southern California. In the NFL, the Los Angeles Rams played there from 1946 to 1979, and again from 2016 to 2019; the Los Angeles Raiders from 1982 to 1994; Super Bowl I in 1967 and Super Bowl VII in 1973; and the postseason Pro Bowl from 1951 to 1972, and again in 1979.

Other pro football teams using the Coliseum: The Los Angeles Dons of the All-America Football Conference from 1946 to 1949, the Los Angeles Chargers of the American Football League in 1960, the Los Angeles Express of the United States Football League from 1983 to 1985, and the Los Angeles Xtreme of the XFL in 2001.

It has hosted the U.S. national soccer team 20 times, starting in 1965; and Mexico's team 61 times. In 1967, the only season of play for the United Soccer Association, it hosted the Los Angeles Wolves, who won that league's title. It also hosted the city's entry in another league starting that season, the Los Angeles Toros of the National Professional Soccer League. After that year, the two leagues merged to form the North American Soccer League, whose Los Angeles Aztecs used the Coliseum as their home field in the 1977 and 1981 seasons.

The Los Angeles Dodgers used the Coliseum as their 1st home field after leaving Brooklyn, while waiting for Dodger Stadium to be built, from 1958 to 1961. Their home games in the 1959 World Series against the Chicago White Sox attracted over 92,000 fans, the highest-attended competitive games in Major League Baseball history. An all-time record crowd for baseball, 115,300, attended a preseason game between the Dodgers and the Boston Red Sox on March 29, 1958, honoring the Dodgers' 50h Anniversary in Los Angeles.

And, of course, the Coliseum was the main venue for the 1932 and 1984 Summer Olympic Games, and will be again in 2028. 

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October 6, 1923 was a Saturday. These other noteworthy college football games were played:

* Army beat Florida, 20-0 on The Plain in West Point, New York.

* Navy beat Dickinson College, 13-7 at Worden Field in Annapolis, Maryland.

* Maryland beat Pennsylvania, 3-0 at Franklin Field in Philadelphia.

* Notre Dame beat Lombard, 14-0 at Cartier Field in South Bend, Indiana.

* The University of Washington beat Willamette, 54-0 at Husky Stadium in Seattle. They would play Navy in the Rose Bowl, and it would end in a 14-14 tie.

* And in New Jersey, Princeton beat Johns Hopkins, 16-7 at Palmer Stadium in Princeton; and Rutgers beat Villanova, 44-0 at Neilson Field in New Brunswick.

In a regular-season baseball game, Ernie Padgett of the Boston Braves, in only his 2nd major-league appearance, pulled off an unassisted triple play in a doubleheader sweep of the Philadelphia Phillies, at Braves Field in Boston. It is the 1st such play in National League history. The Braves won the opener, 5-4 in 14 innings; and won the nightcap, 4-1 in a game called after 5 innings due to darkness.

Born in Philadelphia in 1899, the infielder would only last 5 seasons in the majors, and died in 1957 in East Orange, Essex County, New Jersey.

* The Brooklyn Robins -- as the Dodgers were known during the managerial tenure of Wilbert Robinson, 1914 to 1931 -- beat their arch-rivals, the New York Giants, 4-3 at Ebbets Field. Jack Fournier's grounder into a fielder's choice got Gene Bailey home with the winning run in the bottom of the 10th inning.

* The New York Yankees beat the Philadelphia Athletics, 3-1 at Yankee Stadium. Babe Ruth went 3-for-4 with an RBI, but no home run.

* The Chicago White Sox swept a doubleheader from the Cleveland Indians, 6-3 and 7-6 at League Park in Cleveland.

* The Pittsburgh Pirates beat the Cincinnati Reds, 7-1 at Redland Field (later Crosley Field) in Cincinnati.

* The Detroit Tigers beat the St. Louis Browns, 12-3 at Navin Field (later Briggs Stadium and Tiger Stadium) in Detroit. Ty Cobb, by this point the player-manager of the Tigers, went 1-for-3 with 2 walks and 2 RBIs. George Sisler did not play for the Browns.

* And the St. Louis Cardinals beat the Chicago Cubs, 5-2 at Sportsman's Park in St. Louis.

September 21, 1901: The 1st American League Pennant

Clark Griffith

September 21, 1901: The Chicago White Stockings lose to the Philadelphia Athletics, 10-4 at Columbia Park in Philadelphia. Bill Bernhard outpitches Roy Patterson, who falls to 20-15.

However, the Boston Americans lose to the Detroit Tigers, 3-1 at the Huntington Avenue Grounds in Boston. This means that Chicago clinch the Pennant of the American League, in its 1st season.

The White Stockings were owned by Charles A. Comiskey, a former 1st baseman for the St. Louis Browns of the American Association, who joined the National League and later became the Cardinals. Comiskey had founded the AL with sportswriter Byron Bancroft "Ban" Johnson, who served as the League's 1st President.

The White Stockings were managed by Clark Griffith, who was also their ace pitcher. He had previously pitched in the city for the National League team, formerly named the White Stockings. Their outfielders included Fielder Jones (his actual birth name), who would manage them to win the 1906 World Series; and William "Dummy" Hoy, a sensational fielder and baserunner, who was deaf, but not mute, or "dumb" in the parlance of the time, yet didn't mind, as many deaf men were, being called "Dummy." They finished 83-53, and won the Pennant by 4 games.

In 1903, Griffith became the 1st manager and the 1st pitcher of the New York Highlanders, forerunners of the Yankees. In 1904, the White Stockings officially shortened their name to the "White Sox," presaging the 1908 decision by Boston to become the "Red Sox," rather than adopt the former National League name of "Red Stockings."

In 1910, Comiskey built the ballpark that would bear his name, where the White Sox would play until 1990. In 1912, Griffith bought the Washington Senators, and named their ballpark for himself. In 1955, the Athletics moved to Kansas City; in 1968, to Oakland.

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September 21, 1901 was a Saturday. These other baseball games were played:

* The New York Giants beat the Cincinnati Reds, 5-1 at League Park in Cincinnati.

* The Baltimore Orioles beat the Milwaukee Brewers, 5-2 and 7-2 at Oriole Park in Baltimore. These are not the teams we know by those names today. These Orioles went out of business after the 1902 season, and were replaced by a new franchise, which became the New York Yankees. These Brewers moved for the 1902 season, becoming the St. Louis Browns. In 1954, they moved again, becoming... the Baltimore Orioles.

* The Philadelphia Phillies beat the Pittsburgh Pirates, 4-2 in 10 innings at Exposition Park in Pittsburgh. Despite this, on September 27, the Pirates clinched the NL Pennant. There would be no World Series between the Leagues until a peace agreement was made in 1903.

* The Washington Senators swept a doubleheader from the Cleveland Blues, 18-7 and 11-3 at American League Park in Washington. The Blues became the Naps, in honor of Napoleon Lajoie, in 1903; the Cleveland Indians after Lajoie left, in 1915; and the Cleveland Guardians in 2022. The Senators became the Minnesota Twins in 1961.

* The Chicago Orphans beat the Boston Beaneaters, 1-0 in 17 innings at the West Side Grounds in Chicago. Boston had already been known as Beantown for some time. They went through several name changes before becoming the Braves in 1912, and moving to Milwaukee in 1953 and Atlanta in 1966.

The original Chicago White Stockings had a 1st baseman and manager named Adrian Anson. Because he was the team captain, he became known as Cap. As he got older, he became known as Pop; and his team, because of their comparative youth, were known as the Colts. In 1898, their 1st season without him, the team was called the Orphans, because "they missed their Pop." In 1903, they became the Cubs.

* And the Brooklyn Superbas beat the St. Louis Cardinals, 3-1 at Robison Field in St. Louis. The Superbas became the Dodgers in 1911.

This was also the opening week of the college football season. Few schools now recognized as being from "Power Five" conferences were in action. The most interesting games were 2 teams playing high school teams, which would certainly not be allowed now. Minnesota, generally agreed to be one of the top teams of the era, were held to a 0-0 tie, on home ground at Northrop Field, by Minneapolis Central High School. Nebraska, on the other hand, had no trouble with Lincoln High School, beating them 22-0 at Antelope Field in Lincoln.