THE PESHTIGO FIRE AND THE FIRST MARINETTE VS. MENOMONEE GAME FOOTBALL

 FOOTBALL CATCHING ON THE TWO SCHOOLS LIKE A WILDFIRE

NOTE:  This is a blog about the earliest meeting of two great football programs (Plus a mention of another) and where they stand today.  A story also about a great event that took place in Wisconsin and Michigan. Before moving on in the blog read about the M&M Games from yes, the Congressional Record.  Copy and paste the following to get a feel for the M&M Games… Congressional Record, Volume 152 Issue 114 (Thursday, September 14, 2006) (govinfo.gov) 

In 1893 Menominee High School began playing football and matched up against several Michigan teams.  The game caught the area’s attention and the sport blossomed. The city formed a town team and played such cities as Oconto, Escanaba and Iron Mountain and they were good from the get-go. 

In 1894 the football bug crossed the river that divided the two cities hit Marinette.  The high school’s first game after several weeks of training occurred when they met the local Y.M.C.A. at a place called The Race Course.  Alvin Hilles, the assistant to the Marinette city engineer, was the umpire and had played, what the Eagle-Herald newspaper called the center rush position for Purdue University.  Richard Fairchild (No occupation mentioned) was the referee.  The paper called it a “fine exhibition” as the two squads battled.

As I’ve mentioned in the past, from the early days of the high school game, few newspapers ever printed a roster of the players and when they did it was without the first names.  In my research I found that the Eagle-Herald consistently did so for years posting full coverage of the teams. 

Marinette received the kickoff, but the ball was turned over to the Y.M.C.A. squad after three plays (Remember the story on the 5-yard/7-yard rule?) and Fred McCallum had the ball on the “Y’s” first play.  Will Ross, the right guard for Marinette, reached out and snatched the ball and before the “Y’s” could react, he dashed to the endzone for a score.  The goal (Extra point) was kicked, and Marinette led 6-0.  The euphoria wouldn’t last for long and the boys from the “Y” would blow the high’s away and won 24-6.  Touchdowns were worth four-points, and a goal was worth two.  The paper stated that Will Hamilton of Marinette and Frank Chace for the Y.M.C.A. distinguished themselves by brilliant play that day.

In the crowd watching the game was Mr. Mills, the coach of the Menominee high school team along with his players.  After the game representatives of both teams met and decided to play the next week on Thanksgiving Day.  The game was set to be played at the Race Course and start at 3pm.

The two weeks before Marinette High and the Y.M.C.A. team met, a game was scheduled between Menominee and the “Y’s”.  The paper never mentioned if they met as no score was recorded.  It may have never been played or the score just didn’t make it into the newspaper.  It’s my guess that the Y.M.C.A. players were only a few years older, for the most part, than the high schoolers.  The “Y” team would cease playing regular football around 1898.  Besides the high school and the Y.M.C.A having teams, the local Wisconsin National Guard unit known as Company I formed a team.  They would first play in 1895 and this would become the premier town team in northern Wisconsin.  Company I also often played the Menominee Town Team, the Green Bay Team and the town squads and other military units from Kenosha, Madison, Stevens Point, Manitowoc and upper Michigan.  The Company I squad had such a good team that when Fred Hulbert of the Green Bay Team needed help, he contacted the unit and they would loan a player of two to help the Bay’s. When the United States fought Spain in Cuba in 1898 during the Spanish American War, the unit couldn’t play as they were called up to fight, but they roared back in 1899 and played until just before World War I.

The Firey Prelude to The Sport

Twenty-three years earlier life in the northeast part of Wisconsin changed dramatically.  On October 8, 1871, many events in the Mid-West occurred that changed the look of the landscape.  There was the Great Chicago Fire.  About 3.5 square miles of the city burned and about 300 people perished due to either Mrs. O’Leary’s cow kicking over a lantern in her barn or some guys throwing dice nearby did the same.  Across Lake Michigan there was a major fire in Holland, Michigan that burned many acres and buildings.  About 100 miles north of Holland a blaze broke out in Manistee in what was called the Great Michigan Fire.  There were many deaths here as well, most were lumberjacks plus a few farmers.  Further east, along the Lake Huron shore the Port Huron Fire occurred that same day and night and roared farther up the Michigan “thumb”.  All this occurred on the same day, October 8.

In upper northeast Wisconsin the Peshtigo Fire took place.  The fire started near the woodworking factory on the west side of the town and spread quickly.  Within an hour the town was gone.  Between 1,200-2,500 people lost their lives and over 1.5 million acres of Wisconsin land was burned.  The winds swirled and a person standing only 10-feet away from another burned to a crisp while the other survived with only singed hair or clothing.  In Oconto, Shawano, Brown, Kewaunee, Door, Manitowoc, Outagamie and Marinette counties the blaze burned bright and of course, deadly.  In Door County the town of Brussels burned like Peshtigo and about 120 people died. The northern edge of Green Bay suffered some fire damage as a 10-mile wide and over 40-mile-long path (400 square miles) destroyed lives.  North of Peshtigo, across the Menominee River in Michigan, the windblown fire threatened the town of Menomonee as well as Marinette on the Wisconsin side.  Only about seven miles separated Peshtigo and Marinette, but the latter city escaped the devastation that occurred in the town south of it.  An 1870 the census showed that 1,300+ residents lived in Peshtigo.  The fire caused as many as 800 deaths in Peshtigo alone.  Many people fled into the Peshtigo River to escape the flames, with some resting on a marshy area of the east side of the river.  While the river saved many lives the flames did skip over the survivors and spread eastward as well as threatening Marinette and Menominee to the north.  Thankfully the two cities were mostly saved first by fire brigades in Menominee and in Marinette by the newly formed city fire department.  People from both sides of the “Twin cities” crossed the bridges that connected the two cities to help one another in putting out fires.

The entire upper part of the US had gone through a drought starting in October of 1870 that extended into late 1871.  The fire would severely curtail the lumber business as over 2,000,000 trees would burn plus thousands of farm and forest animals at an estimated cost of $5,000,000 (About $126,000,000 in 2024 dollars). This was a fire that even Bambi couldn’t escape. 

To put things in mid-1900 perspective, during World War II the United States used cluster firebombs to attack Dresden, Germany in February 1945 burning 1,600+ acres of the city with civilian deaths numbering up to 25,000.  In the Pacific the US attacked Tokyo, Japan in March 1945, also with cluster firebombs and 16 square miles of the city burned with over 100,000 deaths and leaving over 1,000,000 people homeless. The differences here was that Dresden was a city of brick and block buildings while much of Tokyo’s home were made of wood.  I mention this to put the Peshtigo fire in perspective.  A lot more human lives lost in the war but a much greater loss of land mass in the Peshtigo Fire.  It would take years for the forests and grasslands in Wisconsin and Michigan to recover.    

Logging was the main industry of the Peshtigo, Menominee and Marinette area as well as all of upper Wisconsin and Michigan in 1871.  The extensive property owned by Canadian born Issac Stephenson, on the Wisconsin side of the Menominee River, and that of his brother, Samual Stephenson on the Michigan side would recover.  The two lumber giants not only fortified their holdings but helped their neighbors build again.  In 1881, Samual built The Menominee Hotel to house big city lumber buyers.  The hotel became so popular that it had to be expanded twice in its 96-year history.  Sadly, while it was to be scheduled for revitalization as part of the planned downtown urban renewal program it burned to the ground on February 11, 1977. 

Issac opened the Stephenson National Bank in Marinette, donated to the founding of the city library and supported multiple local businesses as a partner. Each Stephenson had a town in their respective states named after them as well as an island in the Menominee River.  Very wealthy but not overly ostentatious, they both had political careers as well as the business ventures and relatives would play against each other in the rivalry.  Issac won the US Senate race in 1907 after serving several times in the state assembly as well as the US Congress.  At age 77 he was and is the oldest freshmen, Senator.  He also owned vast tracks of land in Illinois, Indiana and Louisiana.  Samual served in the Michigan House of Representatives and Senate and later served in the U.S. House of Representatives. His business interests, besides lumber and real estate and owned a 900-acre dairy farm near Kenosha. He had vast lumber lands in Michigan as well as having a major lumber interest in the area of North Tonawanda New York.  The local NY high school team would be the “Football Champs of the East” in 1897 and play Madison High School for the football national championship.

THE FIRST M&M MEETING

Excitement was growing in the two communities for the upcoming event.  On Thursday, November 29, 1894, Thanksgiving Day, the two teams played a great first game.

Marinette Eagle-Herald Newspaper, November 30, 1894

Hundreds of fans flocked to The Race Course to watch the first ever meeting between the two schools.  Arriving up to an hour before the opening kickoff, fans jockeyed for a good spot to view the two teams.  Wearing maroon, Menominee overpowered the orange and black uniformed Marinette squad 14-4.  In a few years Menominee would take the nickname “The Maroons” while Marinette would adapt the color purple for their uniforms and become known as the “Marines”.  The Maroon dominated the first half, 14-0, led by McLain who was carried off the field by his teammates and fans after scoring all three touchdowns and one goal.  He was able to weave through the Marinette defense almost at will.  While the game was out of reach for the Wisconsin squad they did score on a fine run by Gene Allen.  The week before against the Y.M.C.A. the roster listed his first name as Jean but it really was spelled Gene.  The fans were respectful of each other throughout the game as they showed their favorites by wearing colorful clothing in their team’s colors.  Sorry, the newspaper didn’t give many additional details.

Currently the rivalry between the two schools is tied for the longest series although there were a few seasons when the two didn’t play.  The Darlington vs. Mineral Point and Sparta vs. Tomah series also started in 1894.  Baraboo vs. Reedsburg started playing in 1900 but have met often more than just once a season as they have played 136 times. 

After losing in 1895, 24-8, let’s move ahead a year to 1896 and look at the rosters for the two teams:

The Marinette lineup

Look at the two lineups.  The name Stephenson pops up, probably grandchildren of Issac and Samual.  After the 1896 win by Mwnomonee, 22-0, Marinette would dominate the series until 2014 when Menomonee finally passed them up.

While the series is only the seventh longest in state history, yet it is possibly the most storied.  It is listed as the third longest interstate rivalry.  The 1949 showdown was covered by Look Magazine in a multi-page layout.  Menominee led the series for the first few seasons until Marinette caught up in 1900 and from then on, the Marines dominated the Maroon until they tied the series in 2013.  Owning an overall 59-50-7 lead in the series, Menominee has dominated the storied matchup the past nine games.  The two didn’t play 13 times over the 129 years of the series but they did play twice in 1899 and 1902.

Overall, Marinette has posted a career 616-403-33 won/loss/tie record, 1894-2023.  On the other hand, Menominee’s record stands at 700-317-40 record, 1893-2023.  Michigan started their own state playoffs in 1976.  Since 1991 Menominee has won at least 10 games 13 times with state titles in 1998, 2006 and 2007 with three runner-up teams plus seven semi-final squads.  Marinette has won one WIAA title, 1989 and since the WIAA playoffs began that has been their only season with 10+ wins.  Marinette won the mythical state title in 1917, 1921, 1922, 1923 and 1926.and 1949.  While Menominee’s fortunes of late have risen, Marinette’s have gone down a bit.

One other school that I want to mention is Peshtigo, a town that rose from the ashes, has a 582-284-19 record and one WIAA title, that being in 1983.  It is remarkable that three schools so close, only seven to ten miles apart, have performed so well over the years.

I’d loke to thank the staff at the Marinette Stephenson Public Library, especially Brooke Uhl for sending me important information and granting access to the school yearbooks that they had on file.  Also, thanks to the staff at the Marinette High School for access to looking at old yearbooks in my research.

Check out the link from WISSPORTS on rivalries for more information…Wisconsin High School Football Rivalries (wissports.net)

NOTES ON SOME EARLY FOOTBALL PROGRAMS…PART 2

Updated on February 21, 2024

Continuing on with some stories on some early teams

1896

 While the Milwaukee City Conference was the first conference to organize in 1893, a second, in 1896 was formed in Dodge County.  At a September meeting in Beaver Dam, that school joined Waupun, Mayville, Fox Lake, Juneau and Horicon to form the Dodge County Athletic Association League.

1897

Post Washington would play its first football game in 1897 as they beat Grafton 18-4 in a late November affair. This was their only reported game.  The school had only 11-male high school students, so they recruited several seventh and eighth graders to fill out the team.  The story of their first game was in the 1925 yearbook, written by a former student, Judge A.J. Hedding, a 1902 graduate who stated that the school did have a team for from 1897-1901 (No official records remain).  Judge Hedding reported that principal T.H. Jones asked his cousin, Delbert Treloar, a Carroll College graduate to coach the team.  Beginning in 1903 basketball for boy’s and volleyball for girls were the only sports that were highlighted in the school yearbooks until 1923.  1921 was the first year that known yearbooks exist. After the 1901 season, based on yearbooks from 1921-25 that featured only basketball and volleyball.  I must conclude that they didn’t play football again until the 1927 team was mentioned in the 1928 yearbook.  Why?  Because the 1924 yearbook only had about 100 students and it was tough to continue to form a team in the earlier years without seventh and eighth graders being part of the squad.

From the 1925 Port Washington yearbook

Mr. Jones would move on and later became superintendent of the West Allis School system.

1898

On October 1, 1989, Green Bay East defeated Kaukauna 34-0.  Kaukauna halfback Miller was the teams star player.  Before the game started Green Bay objected to Miller playing on the grounds that he wasn’t a bonafide student. Kaukauna officials agreed that he wasn’t legit and Green Bay’s captain, Hallock said that they wouldn’t play if Miller was in the game.  However, he changed his mind…remember that in this time period the team captain was often the coach…and his objections were withdrawn.  The Press-Gazette noted that two professors from Kaukauna were also in the lineup!!

1899

From the Manitowoc Pilot newspaper, dated Thursday, October 12 covering the Saturday October 7th game between Green Bay West and Manitowoc a report that West was humbled by the North Side high of Manitowoc.  That means that the city may have had at least two high schools but today the North school would be Manitowoc Lincoln.  In losing 49-11 West fumbled frequently and suffered a number of injuries so at one point a teacher was called to fill in.

1899

In 1899 Marinette opened their season on October 7 against Escanaba (MI).  On the opening kickoff the ball went to Marcus Lindhem who took the kick on the Marinette 15-yard line.  As he ran up the field and crossed mid-field (The field was 110-yards long at that time) near the Marinette 50 Lindhem was hit and the ball popped out of his hands and Chet Porter caught in mid-air and carried it the final 50-yards for a touchdown.  Marinette went on to win 17-0 and would post a 7-0-1 season record.  

1901

The opening game of the season for Green Bay West was called off against their opponent, Seymour.  It seems that Seymour had two “students” that were at least 21-year-old, and the game was to be between “strictly students”.   There were lively discussions between the teams.  The players were dressed for combat but when West saw the two from Seymour, large enough to be playing on their city team they declined to play.  West thought that they were being treated unfairly and left the field before the start of the game.

1901

In 1901 Madison High School (Name changed later to be known as Madison Central) was in the midst of a 5-1-1 season when in their second game against Evansville a dispute started before the event even started.  It seems that Evansville had a player named Richardson whose age was in dispute.  A lengthy discussion between coaches and administrators over the age of that player.  The Madison Tychoberahn (The name of the school yearbook) stated, jokingly of course:

“The first fairly heavy game was with Evansville at Camp Randall which at first more resembled an oratorical contest than a football game.  The preliminary joint debate as to the eligibility of Richardson was decided in favor of Madison and the game therefore played under suspension of the interscholastic rules.  Mr. Richardson was found later to be one of Evansville’s oldest settlers having voted for president almost since the time of Jackson and Van Buren.  The score was 10-6, the game ending by Evansville’s withdrawal from the field”.

Such wonderful prose in a yearbook.

The WIAA later found that Richardson failed to meet the eligible age requirement.

Disputes over eligibility would occur many times in the future as you will read further.

 1902

While doing research on the history of Green Bay East and West I found a story of some interest that occurred on Sunday, November 2.  It seems that the Mayor Taylor of Green Bay called the police.  Officer Howard was directed to tell the players of the two high school’s junior squads to disband their game on the north side of the West campus.  It seemed that the Rev. W.A. Garfield of the First Presbyterian Church felt that the noise the two teams were making was disturbing his Sunday School classes.  By the time they moved their game to the other side of the school a heavy rain arrived, and the game was cancelled.  The reverends sermon that day was about The Flood. He must have gotten his wish to "wash" the football players away.

1902

I found a story in the December 30, 1902, edition of the Green Bay Press-Gazette that disproves previous information that I had received several years ago. I had read in a story that the WIAA didn't officially declare a state football champion in the early years. I, at first that thought that the story was incorrect as I saw a picture of a banner that both Milwaukee South Side (South Division) in 1898 and Edgerton in 1916 had received banners from the WIAA declaring that they were recognized as the official state champion. The article in the Press-Gazette stated:

There is no mention of a flag but the story states that Fort Atkinson was the official champion. Over the early days of the sport the WIAA would try and not get mixed up as to who was champion, but these are clear indications that, on occasion, the WIAA got involved.

1903

In a meeting of the Milwaukee School Board, Director Jeremiah Quin introduced a referendum to “severe the terms”, abolish high school football in Milwaukee.  The proposal was to ask that all principals consider dropping the game.  The referendum was referred to the board’s rules committee.  It was later cancelled when East Side principal, George A. Chamberlin, forced the issue to be dropped.

1904

More about Green Bay West as two weeks in a row the team was involved in controversy.  On October 22 West lost to Kewaunee 12-0 by what was called “Outsiders”.  Four players from the “Town Team” were recruited to play against the Green Bay high school.  One was a guy who was heavier than any single West player, a 185-pound fullback, who bulled his way through the defense. After the game Kewaunee officials admitted that they had used ringers, and they weren’t remorseful about doing so.  Kewaunee was not part of the WIAA so they felt justified in their actions.

The next Saturday West faced Oshkosh and the problem was the referee.  The trouble started with the ball on the Oshkosh 10-yard line.  A 15-yard penalty was accessed but one official marked it five yards, half the distance to the goal and then another marked it eight yards putting the ball on the two. However, the two officials, hired by Oshkosh, declared that West still failed, with the penalty, to get a first down.  When West asked for a proper measurement with the ball on the two their request was refused.  The game ended 0-0 and Oshkosh asked for a rematch which West said they would oblige if it was on a neutral site with neutral officials.

1907

Coach Cody Clark was in a dilemma.  He was charged with coaching both the Marquette University Hilltoppers football team as well as that of the Marquette Academy Junior Hilltoppers.  This was the Academy’s first season of playing the sport.  Clark was having problems coaching both squads so, after the first game, an October 1, a12-11 victory against Milwaukee East Side (East Division or Riverside) he turned the reigns over to Larry Gillick.  The team finished with a 5-2-2 record.

In the season’s final game, the officials, provided by St. Ignatius being played in Chicago, could not agree on the legality of the forward pass.  This was a new rule that allowed for the forward pass in 1906.  Each time Marquette utilized the forward pass the head referee would call a penalty on Marquette.  The line official disagreed each time with the other head official but was overruled.  Things became intense and Coach Gillick pulled his team off the field and vowed to never play St. Ignatius again. Marquette University also played that November 28 against St. Ignatius College and lost 12-0.  In addition to the two Marquette’s playing that day so did St. Louis University who defeated Nebraska 34-0.  St. Louis Coach Eddie Cochems team used, as the Chicago Tribune put it “the pass to perfection”.  Cochems is considered, as I’ve written before, the “father of the forward pass “.

Gillick would coach in 1908 as the Hilltoppers earned a 4-1-1 record.  Marquette didn’t play St. Ignatius in 1908 but the school got their revenge in 1910 as they won 54-0 under the direction of George Dutcher.

1917

If you missed my three blogs a from March 2022 about the controversy of the state title in 1917, please read them but I have a bit more on La Crosse.  At the time that I wrote the stories I was wondering why the school started their season later than most of the other contending teams.  The season was nearly called off because of World War I.  It seems that the national and local economies were not strong at the start of the season.  The Chamber of Commerce and the school district didn’t feel that they could financially support the program.  Three weeks into the season support was finally given in the form of $500 by people and students who bought season tickets and the team was finally able to corner a few schools to play.  Most schedules had been set enough that La Crosse had to play three college teams and several high schools from Minnesota to help fill in what turned out to be a 4-2-0 record.  If you haven’t read the blogs, I think that they give a valuable insight into additional early Wisconsin high school football history.

Also, in 1917 a Mr. Young (First name is unknown to my research), a teacher of shorthand at Burlington high school seems to have introduced the sport.  Mr.  Young coached various sports over the years.  The old yearbooks were not available, so I looked at the Burlington Free Press newspaper and found that the high school played their first game against a group of alumni on October 5 and lost 18-7.  Since there were no newspaper reports for a football team in the 1910-1916 years the alumni were somehow made familiar with the sport.  As typical of the era the newspaper reported the average weight of the teams.  The alumni were listed as being 165 lbs. and the high school players were listed as 140 lbs.  A 1920 story in the paper said that the Burlington Athletic Association went severely into debt to purchase new football uniforms in 1919 and that although the total money had not yet been paid off the Ross Wilcox American Legion post would take over the debt and complete payment.  Only 12 players were listed as being out for the 1920 team.  A number of students must have eventually tried out as in a later news story Mr. Young was holding winter indoor training at the school gym for basketball, wrestling, races, indoor baseball and the instruction every Tuesday of the first and second football teams.

I hope you liked looking at some interesting early football facts.  There was the occasional hijinks and chicanery but for the most part the game was clean.  Well, almost.  While I deal with high school football there are a few stories to relate about early town teams.  Here are a few about the Green Bay Team.

I ran across multiple stories in the Green Bay Press-Gazette on the early days of football in that city.  As I will relate in a story on the first two games between Green Bay East and Green Bay West, the paper made it hard to understand for the reader when they called teams The East Siders, East High, West Siders, West High or The Green Bay Team.  You will see how confusing it was to decide what the paper was trying to convey, team wise in that future blog. 

Fred Hulbert (As mentioned in Part 1…Wayland Academy) was in several rough and tumble games.  Looking back at the passing controversy that Marquette Had against Chicago St. Ignatius in 1907, this was an occasional occurrence where a team would walk off the field over some sort of dispute.  While the situations that I found dealing with Fred Hulbert and The Green Bay team isn’t about high school but rather semi-pro ball I can’t pass up the chance to relate Hulbert’s problems.

You’ve heard the saying “I’m picking up my ball and going home”.  Well on at least two occasions that happened.  The first was in a game in 1894, the first season of The Green Bay Team. The Green Bay Team was playing against the Menomonie (MI) town team.  It was a bloody affair and Hulbert was knocked unconscious by a blow to his nose which was broken.  As The Press-Gazette put it “a little thing like that doesn’t count in football”, probably meaning this was to be expected.  With the melee that was occurring Hulbert's broken nose was minor stuff.  A doctor watching the game came over and attended to Hulbert and when the Menomonie player came over to apologize, Hulbert refused to accept the gesture.  Things really got out of hand and the game was called with Green Bay winning 10-4.  However, the officials decided to call it a “no contest” and both sides began to protest. Hulbert was now up and around, and he and another player named Thomas protested and it nearly came to blows with the officials before the game was declared a Green Bay victory. 

The second occurred in 1896 when against Oconto he pulled his team from the field after not agreeing with the officials.  In this case he really did pick up the ball…it was his personal football…and walked off.  There were no other balls in good enough shape to use so the game was called so his fellow teammates followed his lead and refused to play. 

 Such were the shenanigans of the era.

A lot of thanks to Bill Dorst and Patrick Foran for giving me leads on some of the information in this two-part series.

NOTES ON SOME EARLY FOOTBALL PROGRAMS…PART 1

I’ve done a lot of research on a lot of schools and here are some interesting facts on early Wisconsin high school football.  So, let’s start at the beginning.  These are notes on various programs.

1884

In 1884 Delafield St. John’s Military Academy opened.  It’s founder, Rev. Sydney. Smyth had played football while studying at Racine College.  Of course, the game was really more of a rugby style sport but the locals there called it “foot-ball”.  The next year, 1895, using a book he obtained from somewhere, he taught his students the newest rules of the game.  The team went 2-1-0 in 1885 against local “Town teams”.  Smythe made sure ahead of time that their opponents knew what the new rules were all about. They were the first high school team in Wisconsin to play the sport and are accredited as the first school west of the Allegany Mountains to play by the newest rules.

1989-1893

The second high school to play football was Wayland University (Now known as Wayland Academy).  Granted that Wayland and St. John’s were not formal public schools but the earliest Academies to play school sponsored sports, in particular foot-ball. Wayland had both a university and a high school.   In 1889 some men, who had played at the University of Michigan, came to Wayland in Beaver Dam and taught the students of both the high school part of the school and those part of the university the game.  There were two dorms at the school…The Cottage Boy’s and the College Hall Boy’s. The two dorms played several intermural scrimmages that year.  The first formal high school game was played in 1891 against Ripon College a frequent opponent of Wayland, St. John’s and Oshkosh High School, Oshkosh Normal and Lawrence University.  The Wayland team may have had some university players on its team.  Their star player was Fred Hulbert, the “father of Green Bay football” who started the Green Bay Team (Town team), a forerunner of the Packers in 1894.  When Fred, born in Chicago but considered a Racine native, arrived in Green Bay at age 25 he brought with him the first football the town had ever seen.  Besides taking a job as a clerk for the Union Laundry he joined the West Side Athletic Association first as a trainer and then as captain of the fledgling foot-ball team (Football was often spelled foot-ball in newspapers and other stories of the day).  As captain he really was the coach and he instructed others on the tactics of the sport and was the driving force behind the sport there.

1893

Milwaukee’s first high school opened in 1857, nine years after Wisconsin became a state but closed its doors in 1860 as the Civil War was approaching.  A school housing with an enrollment of 100 boys and girls in a primary setting finally reopened in 1868 and a year later Milwaukee High School formally opened.  The location was on the corner of N. Van Buren and E. Juneau Ave. but the school was moved to N. Cass and E. Knapp Streets where it would become East Side High School, sometimes called “Old Eastside” and is now Riverside.  A gym was built in 1890 and the school club sports of baseball and football were played.  A newly formed Athletic Society was formed to regulate the sports for the school.

On February 22, 1893, the school leaders of Milwaukee High, Delafield St. John’s Military Academy, and Fond du Lac High School formed an alliance and the first WIAA was formed.  Soon, Wayland Academy of Beaver Dam, Lawrence University of Appleton and Ripon College joined the group and the seeds of the future WIAA was formed.  The Milwaukee City Conference was also formed that year as well with South Side (South Division) joining in 1893 and West Side (West Division, which closed and would later become The Milwaukee Academy of the Arts) joining in 1895 to become part of the conference.

The school’s name was changed to Milwaukee East Side in 1893 and they played their first football game against athletes of the Northwestern Mutual Life Insurance, a game East lost (No score known).

Teacher, coach and later long-term principal of East Side High School is George A. Chamberlin is in the top right of the team photo…from the 1915 Commencement Annual.

Against NW Mutual coach/teacher George A. Chamberlin played left end and according to the Milwaukee Journal made a key tackle to prevent a score.  The commencement annual noted that their “coach and faculty member” was quite a promising youngster.

The two teams again played in several games during 1894 and it seems that, although the scores aren’t known, East was 2-1-0 against the Mutuals.  In 1895 East Side played South Side for the first time and in two games tied 12-12 and won 14-6.  For some reason East didn’t play football in 1899, the only year they had no team.  Against the powerful South Side teams of early high school football East posted only a 4-13-2 record over a twenty-year period (1895-1914).

More 1893

1893 appears to be the beginning for many schools.  Oshkosh high school played their first game but as a combined squad with Oshkosh Normal (UW-Oshkosh).  One score I found from that season was a 42-0 loss to Lawrence University, a game played in Appleton.  The next season the high school played without Normal players as their own team and posted a 3-0-0 record.

Again, in 1893 Madison high school (Closed in 1968, playing their last game in the 1967) played its first game.  This would be a school that posted one of the best early records from 1893-1929 (181-44-16) and its name would be changed to Madison Central.  In 1897 Madison would play North Tonawanda (NY) for the first mythical high school national championship in Detroit on Christmas Day, winning 14-4.

This was also the year, 1893, that a football team was formed at Darlington and began to train.  They would play their first games in 1894 going 2-3-0, beating Dodgeville twice and losing twice to Mineral Point and once to Platteville Normal.

1894

In 1894 the students at Eau Claire high school formed an athletic association.  The group was made up of numerous students’ activities beyond athletics.  At the time the school had the second largest enrollment of any high school in the state, 337, with Madison High’s 354 being the biggest.  In 1894 the city population of Eau Claire was 17,000+ while Madison’s population was 15,000+.  That’s only about 2% of the city’s populations.  Today, about 6.5 % of the population in these two cities attend high school.  In the 1890’s-10940’s many school age children dropped out of school early, many around the sixth grade so they could work and help their family.   The EC Athletic Association also created the school yearbook, financed through gaining a large amount of local business advertising support.  They published 3-6 a year seasonal edition that were usually a 40+ page editions each.  The yearbook covered poetry, stories, history, music and more besides sports.  The yearbook was titled “The Kodak”, named after the first personal camera that was developed around 1892.  The books were a snapshot of student lives.  The name Kodak remains the title of Eau Claire Memorial’s yearbook.  Eau Claire would go 3-2-1 in their first football season, 1895, and become a powerful program in the northeast part of the state.

1895-1896

The Fox Lake Representative newspaper printed an article on how the game of football is played on October 25, 1895.

Fox Lake had played a game earlier the week before, having beaten Mayville 14-8, when they met Waupun on November 9th for what was Waupun’s first game.  Fox Lake won 12-6 even though Waupun scored the first touchdown of the game.

From an earlier story in the Representative, I’m including the first names of the Fox Lake team:

Baker was one of the stars but unfortunately his first name is unknown as there is no yearbook from that time and his first name wasn’t mentioned anywhere else in the paper.

More early football stories next time in Part 2.