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Pine Village Football

Location: SR 55 at Pine Village Fire Station, Pine Village. (Warren County, Indiana)

Installed: 2002 Indiana Historical Bureau, Pine Village Town Board, Businessmen, and Lions Club

ID# : 86.2002.1

Text

Side one:

Local team was important Indiana precursor to modern professional football organizations. Clinton Beckett introduced football to Pine Village High School 1898. Town and high school teams played on bottomland, northwest of here, starting local football tradition. Town team, the Villagers, managed by C. J. Shackleton and later by Claire Rhode.

Side two:

Team became "professional" 1915, claiming state and regional championships. Jim Thorpe, All-American, played for Villagers in 1915 Thanksgiving Day game against Purdue All-Stars; Villagers won 29 to 0. Team was a founder of Indiana Football League 1917. Following World War I, the Villagers played intermittently until 1927.

Keywords

Sports

Annotated Text

Local team was important Indiana precursor to modern professional football organizations.(1) Clinton Beckett introduced football to Pine Village High School 1898.(2) Town and high school teams played on bottomland, northwest of here, starting local football tradition.(3) Town team, the Villagers, managed by C. J. Shackleton and later by Claire Rhode.(4)

Team became "professional" 1915, claiming state and regional championships.(5) Jim Thorpe, All-American, played for Villagers in 1915 Thanksgiving Day game against Purdue All-Stars; Villagers won 29 to 0.(6) Team was a founder of Indiana Football League 1917.(7) Following World War I, the Villagers played intermittently until 1927.(8)

Notes:

(1) Ralph Swim, "When Giants Played..., " Review Republican, May 31, 2001; Williamsport Pioneer, November 6, 1927.

(2) Williamsport Pioneer, September 23, 1943; Robert Carr, "Pine Village, Cradle of Professional Football, " Good Ol' Days, Vol. 1, No. 5 (October 1988), 5.

(3) Doris Cottingham, PINE VILLAGE FOOTBALL: The Inside " Dope." (Williamsport, Ind., 2001), 1; Warren Review, November 28, 1901; Williamsport Pioneer, November 3, 6, 1927.

(4) Warren Review, November 28, 1901; Williamsport Pioneer, November 6, 1927.

(5) Williamsport Pioneer, November 5, 1915; Lafayette Daily Courier, November 26, 1915; Carr, p. 25, 27.

(6) Indiana Daily Times, November 26, 1915; David L. Porter, ed., Biographical Dictionary of American Sports, Football (New York, 1987), 597.

(7) Lake County Times, September 26, 1917.

(8) Cottingham, pp.151, 152, 169, 173, 174.