In the fastest, fiercest, and most bitterly contested football game of the season, Columbia University yesterday defeated Portland High School by the score of 5 to 0.
Long before time for the game the grandstand was filled with rooters, the Cardinal and White of high school mingled with the Purple and White of Columbia. When the Columbia team trotted into the field a hoarse roar arose from the Columbia contingent. Cheer after cheer greeted the padded warriors from Columbia and this was followed by songs and waving of banners. A minute later the boys in the Cardinal sweaters invaded the gridiron and once again a roar from the grandstand, mingled with the screams of the fair Cowbells, ones, echoed and re-echoed over the common. horns, megaphones and tin pans and many other noise-producing instruments blended in one continuous, hideous roar.
After a few minutes of signal practice by the teams, Referee (S. M.) Kerron took a coin from his pocket and sent it spinning into the air. "Heads," said the Columbia captain, and "heads" it was. Columbia chose to defend the north goal.
While the teams arranged themselves upon the field of battle silence prevailed. Grussi carefully placed the ball for the kick-off.
"Are you ready, High School?" asked the referee.
"Ready, Columbia?"
"Ready," shouted both captains, and instantly the pigskin was booted into High School's territory, and the first game of the interscholastic season was on.
High could do nothing with the ball and was forced to punt. The cheering in the grandstand was resumed stronger than before . . .
And so on for a column. The lead (beginning) did what leads of earlier stories had not been doing— told the main point of the story. But it did not summarize points of interest; instead, the second paragraph was taken up with sketching in the atmosphere of the occasion. There is indeed, throughout the account, an emphasis on atmosphere and less specific attention to vital details of the play than prevailed in football stories of a later day. Modern writers condense a good bit of this extended description by saying, casually, that Columbia won the toss, and chose the north goal, and . . kicked off to . . .
The account of the Columbia-Hill Military game on the next Saturday was poured from the same general mold as the one just quoted.
Coaches received much less attention from the sports writers those days. For that matter, they were not regarded as so important
