Football

New York: Grosset & Dunlap, 1969. Presumed First Edition, First printing thus. Hardcover. 154, [6] pages. Decorative cover. Illustrated endpapers. Illustrations. Footnotes. Index. Earl Schenck Miers (27 May 1910 – 17 November 1972) was an American historian. He wrote over 100 books. As a child and started writing with a typewriter while he was in school as his cerebral palsy prevented his ability to write with a pencil. Miers received honorary degrees from Lincoln College and Rutgers University. Gridiron football, also known as North American football or, in North America, simply football, is a family of football team sports primarily played in the U. S. and Canada. American football, which uses 11-player teams, is the form played in the U. S. and the best known form of gridiron football worldwide, while Canadian football, featuring 12-player teams, predominates in Canada. Other derivative varieties include arena football, flag football and games such as touch and street football. Football is played at professional, collegiate, high school, semi-professional, and amateur levels. These sports originated in the 19th century out of games related to modern rugby football, more specifically rugby union football. American and Canadian football developed alongside each other and were originally more distinct before Canadian teams adopted features of the American game and vice versa. Both varieties are distinguished from other football sports by their use of hard plastic helmets and shoulder pads, the forward pass, the system of downs, a number of unique rules and positions, measurement in customary units of yards, and a distinctive brown leather ball in the shape of a prolate spheroid with pointed ends. The sport developed from informal games played in North America during the 19th century. Early games had a variety of local rules and were generally similar to modern rugby union and soccer. The earliest recorded instance of gridiron football occurred at University of Toronto's University College in November 1861. Later in the 1860s, teams from universities were playing each other, leading to more standardized rules and the creation of college football. While several American schools adopted rules based on the soccer rules of the English Football Association, Harvard University held to its traditional "carrying game". Meanwhile, McGill University in Montreal used rules based on rugby union. In 1874, Harvard and McGill organized two games using each other's rules. Harvard took a liking to McGill's rugby-style rules, and subsequently played several other U.S. colleges over the next several years using these rules. American football teams and organizations subsequently adopted new rules which distinguished the game from rugby. Many of these early innovations were the work of Walter Camp, including the sport's line of scrimmage and the system of downs. Another consequential change was the adoption of the forward pass in 1906, which allowed the quarterback to throw the ball forward over the line of scrimmage to a receiver. Around the same time Camp devised the rules for American football, the Canadian game would develop in the same way (but separately) from the American game; the Burnside rules were instrumental in establishing many of the rules for the modern game. Condition: Good / No Dust Jacket present.

Keywords: Football, Red Grange, Sports, Knute Rockne, Walter Camp, George Gipp, George Halas, Earl Lambeau, Quarterback, Jim Thorpe, Notre Dame, Rose Bowl, Amos Alonzo Staff, Pop Warner, Washington Redskins

[Book #84967]

Price: $25.00

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