Walter Camp: Football and the Modern Man

by Julie des Jardins

Americans are obsessed with football, yet they know little about the man who shaped the game to make it uniquely technical, physical, and 'man-making' at once. Walter Camp, the "Father of American Football," was the foremost authority on American athletics and arguably the greatest amateur American athlete of his time.

In Walter Football and the Modern Man , Julie Des Jardins chronicles the life of the clock company executive and self-made athlete who remade football and redefined the ideal man. As a student at Yale University, Camp was a varsity letterman who led the earliest efforts to codify the rules and organization of football-including the line of scrimmage and "downs"-to make it distinct from English rugby. He also invented the All-America Football Team and wrote some of the first football fiction, guides, and sports page coverage, making him the foremost popularizer of the game. Within a decade American football was an obsession on college campuses of the Northeast. By the turn of the century, it was a bona fide national pastime.

Since the Civil War, college men of good breeding had not a physical skirmish to harden them. They had grown soft, Americans feared, both in body and attitude. Camp saw football as the antidote to the degeneration of these young men. When massive numbers of college football players enlisted to fight in World War I, Camp held them up as proof that football turned men effective and courageous. His influence over the game, however, was not always viewed as beneficial. Under his watch, dozens of college and high school players were killed or maimed on the gridiron. President Theodore Roosevelt urged him to reform football to prevent administrators from banning it, but Camp was ambivalent about removing the very physicality that made the game man-making in his eyes. The criticism targeted at him over the aggressiveness of football still haunts the game today.

In this fast-paced biography, Julie Des Jardins shows how the "gentleman athlete" was as much the arbiter of football as he was the arbiter of modern manhood. Though eventually football took on meanings that Camp never intended, his impact on the professional and college game is simply unsurpassed.

Genres: Sports

387 pages, Kindle Edition

First published August 1, 2015

Reviews

[patrick Lorelli · Rating 4 out of 5]

Good or bad Walter Camp is still part of today’s football. Most people just don’t talk about him and though part of the game remains the same as when he began organizing teams and plays. There is still talk of the violence of the game something he was criticized for as well but he never backed. He even said part of the toughness of the soldiers in WWI were they played football. True as it may be this is a good book and just shows that since when football started there has always been criticism. I received this book from Netgalley.com I gave it 4 stars Follow us at www.1rad-readerreviews.com

[Erik Ryberg · Rating 4 out of 5]

I had my doubts that this would be interesting or have an impact, but it was great to read about early American football and the development of the game at the hands of Walter Camp. If seeking to find out about the origins of the game and the concerns about player safety, the need for full time coaches, particular plays and rivalries this is the book. Written in an engaging manner.

[Oliver Bateman · Rating 5 out of 5]

i wrote a longer review of this, but i guess the internet ate it. in sum:

way way way better than i expected. des jardins, who I'd never heard of before I was sent this review copy, is a "real deal" writer, her archival and secondary source work is on point, and this book quite honestly deserved a trade press release. it was a joy to read, and hopefully wins some awards. alas, the rational part of me is certain it'll pass unnoticed into the dustbin of history writing. :/

so add this book to your masculinity or gender studies syllabi. give poor julie des jardins some business!

[Tarrant · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent read --even if you aren't a serious football fan. It puts into focus so many of the stories you hear today about football.