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From the Archives: Bentley Historical Library
Michigan Athletics and the Bentley Historical Library have had a great partnership for years. As we celebrated the 150th year of Michigan Athletics we highlighted this partnership and brought to life some of the athletics memorabilia that lives in the walls of the Bentley. Throughout the 2015-16 school year we showcased photos and videos under the heading "From the Archives" as we focused on some great untold stories.
To see more from the U-M Bentley Historical Library, visit bentley.umich.edu or visit the library on North Campus at 1150 Beal Avenue, Monday-Friday from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. For appointments, please call (734) 764-3482.
Hubbard Gets His Long Jump Record
6/14/2016 - William DeHart Hubbard won the gold medal in the long jump at the 1924 Olympics in Paris, but he didn't get the world record he had been striving for. American teammate Bob LeGendre, who failed to make the team as a long jumper, uncorked a leap of 25 feet, 5.7 inches while competing in the pentathlon. Hubbard's gold-medal jump the next day fell almost a foot short. Hubbard returned to U-M for the 1925 season and closed his senior year in spectacular fashion. He tied world records in the 60- and 100-yard dashes and won the conference 100-yard dash and long jump crowns. In his final appearance as a Wolverine at the NCAA meet in Chicago, Hubbard opened by winning the 100-yard dash in 9.8 and then got his world record with jump of 25 feet, 10 3/4 inches, a mark that stood for more than three years.
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Were Women on the Court Before Men?
6/7/2016 - While Michigan men's basketball celebrated its 100th season in 2015-16, it is interesting to note that women may have been playing the game on campus before men. This photo of the class of 1903 women's team appeared in the 1903 "Michiganensian." The Bentley's Wilfred B. Shaw collection includes a group photo of the captains of the 1902, '03, '04 and '05 class teams, meaning women had organized class teams as early as 1902, even before the founding of the Women's Athletic Association in 1905. The first photos and results for men's interclass teams do not appear in the "Ensian" until 1907.
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1924 Regional Olympic Trials at Ferry Field
5/31/2016 - Ferry Field hosted the 1924 Midwest Regional U.S. Olympic track and field tryouts, and 18 U-M athletes entered the competition. Freshman Victor Leschinsky (pictured) set an unofficial record in winning the 200-meter race, and eight U-M men qualified for the national tryouts. James Brooker (bronze, pole vault) and William DeHart Hubbard (gold, long jump) represented the U.S. and U-M in the Paris Games. George Hester, who took part in the U.S. trials, competed for Canada.
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Clockwise from left: Coach Red Berenson and bench in 1989, Bernard Gagnon, Randy Neal.
When Hockey Got Its Wings
5/24/2016 - Coach Red Berenson famously introduced the winged design on the ice hockey helmet on the eve of the 1989 CCHA playoffs. Like many great ideas, however, it wasn't completely original. In the 1971-72 season Al Renfrew's team wore plain dark helmets with a wing design and a single stripe along the center ridge strap. Renfrew's wing lasted just one season as the team reverted to a plain dark helmet. After some initial skepticism among the players, Berenson's winged helmet has become an iconic symbol of Michigan hockey.
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Gridgraph used to "broadcast" the 1923 Wisconsin Game in Hill Auditorium
Gridgraph at Hill Auditorium
5/17/2016 - Long before Hill Auditorium hosted a signing day extravaganza, the venerable hall was regularly filled with U-M fans for away football games, following their team's fates on an elaborate "gridgraph." Before there was radio, the first "broadcasts" of away games were the work of The Michigan Daily, which received telegraphic updates on the game and posted them on a scoreboard on campus. For the 1903 Minnesota game (the "Brown Jug game"), U-M student David Mattice sat perched in a telephone booth atop a 40-foot pole at Northrup Field. He called the action over the telephone wire to a bank of 10 phones in University Hall Auditorium where students, each in turn, took in as much of Mattice's commentary as they could repeat and relayed it to the crowd with a megaphone. The progress of the ball was marked on a large gridiron diagram. With the development of loudspeakers and amplifiers, the "broadcaster's" voice could be sent directly to the crowd, and evermore elaborate gridgraphs were devised to chart the game. The model pictured was purchased by the Alumni Association in about 1921. The first radio broadcasts of U-M football came in 1924, but the gridgraph at Hill continued through the 1929 season. The Alumni Association and The Michigan Daily combined to sponsor gridgraphs at the Michigan Union for some games through 1933.
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Coed Crew on the Huron
5/10/2016 - The boat may not be as sleek as a modern shell, and the oars don't sport a winged helmet, but these ladies from circa 1879-81 are part of a long tradition of rowing at Michigan. A Student Boating Association was organized as early as 1873 and claimed 300 members in 1877. The students acquired two shells and rigged up a boat house on the Huron River (probably just west of the railroad station). The oarsmen had ambitions of carrying the maize and blue colors to the great collegiate regatta at Lake Saratoga to take on Harvard, Yale and Cornell. Finances and logistics got in the way, however, and the 19th century enthusiasm for rowing eventually faded. U-M later developed nationally competitive men's and women's rowing teams at the club sport level. The women's team achieved varsity status in 1996 and is now in its 20th year. Learn more about its rich history in the latest M Magazine.
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From left: John Lenfesty, captain Joseph Royston, John Howard, coach Tom Trueblood
Stars of the 1931 Golf Team
5/3/2016 - "Stars of the 1931 Golf Team." That is how the Michigan Alumnus Magazine described John Lenfesty, captain Joseph Royston, John Howard and coach Tom Trueblood. The first team to play on Michigan's new course kicked off the greatest run in U-M golf history. Lenfesty, Royston, Howard, Alexander Jolly, Eugene Hand and Richard Livingston led Michigan to a fourth-place finish in its first NCAA appearance. Over the next five years U-M finished second in 1932 and 1933, captured national titles in 1934 and 1935, and placed fourth in 1936. John Fischer (1932) and Chuck Kocsis (1936) won individual NCAA titles.
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From left: George Huntzicker, Wayne Miller, Dave Jacobs
Michigan's Tramp Champs: Huntzicker, Miller, Jacobs
4/26/2016 - Michigan's 1968 men's gymnastics team featured three NCAA trampoline champions and two world champions. George Huntzicker captured NCAA titles in 1968 and 1970 and finished second in the world in 1970. Wayne Miller won an NCAA title in 1966 and was world champion in 1966 and 1970. And Dave Jacobs was a two-time NCAA champion (1967 and 1969) who won world titles in 1967 and 1968. Trampoline had long been a strong point for U-M gymnastics, with previous NCAA championships from Edsel Buchanan (1949-51), Ed Cole (1959) and Gary Erwin (1964-65). Erwin also was world champion in 1965 after finishing second in 1964. U-M won the final two NCAA team trampoline titles in 1969 and 1970 before trampoline was dropped as an NCAA sport after the 1970 season.
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From left: Pete Elliott, Carol Holly and Elroy Hirsch
Avid Lettermen (and Women)
4/19/2016 - Multi-sport athletes are less common today, but Pete Elliott, Carol Holly and Elroy Hirsch set the standard at U-M. Elliott (1945-49), with the benefit of an extra year of eligibility during WWII, earned four letters each in football, basketball and golf. Holly (1944-48) probably holds the record for women. Under the Women's Athletic Association's point system, Holly won 14 "letters" in seven sports. The Michiganensian dubbed her "U-M's own Babe Didrikson Zaharias" after the famed multi-sport athlete (and then oddly photographed her holding a coat rack). In the women's varsity era Penny Neer (1979-83) leads the way with eight letters in three sports (basketball, softball, track and field). A number of female athletes have since earned eight letters in cross country and track. Hirsch (1943-44) is the only athlete to win four varsity letters in a single year. The University of Wisconsin star, nicknamed "Crazylegs," was transferred to U-M under the Navy's V-12 program and lettered in football, basketball, baseball, and track and field. He sometimes went from the pitcher's mound directly to the long jump pit. On May 27 Hirsch pitched a 12-1 win over Indiana in Bloomington and then raced to Champaign, Illinois, to place third in the conference track meet.
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Charles Fonville, World Record Setter
4/12/2016 - He was not a large man by today's shot put standards, but, as illustrated in this photo sequence from the Michiganensian, superb technique and speed across the circle propelled Charles Fonville to the top of the track and field world. He won the Big Ten indoor and outdoor and NCAA shot put titles in 1947 as a sophomore and then repeated the sweep in 1948. At the April 1948 Kansas Relays, Fonville almost withdrew over a racial incident. He stayed just long enough to throw 58 feet 1/4 inch and break the 14-year-old world record by more than a foot. He was the favorite for the 1948 Olympic gold medal, but a back injury kept him off the U.S. team. After back surgery, he returned to win the Big Ten indoor title in 1950, though he never approached his world class distances.
 Fonville discusses the 1948 Kansas Relays and his U-M career 
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2005 Softball Sends a Message
4/5/2016 - As the 2015 Michigan softball team prepared for the NCAA Women's College World Series last May, members of U-M's 2005 national champion team took it upon themselves to offer some personal advice and encouragement to Team 38, to savor the moment but never forget the goal. Each 2005 player wrote to the 2015 player wearing her corresponding uniform number to share experiences and insights. None was more inspiring than No. 16 Samantha Findlay's message for Morgan Swift -- a three-page, handwritten gem. The 2015 Wolverine women ultimately lost to the University of Florida in the championship game, but with the aid of assistant coach Bonnie Tholl and the softball staff, these passionate letters of support are now preserved at the Bentley Library -- permanent expressions of what it means to be a Wolverine.
 Samantha Findlay Letter to Morgan Swift 
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Michigan Beats Owens and OSU
3/29/2016 - Ferry Field, May 25, 1935, is remembered for what many consider the greatest individual performance in track and field history. To a gritty band of Wolverines, however, it was the site of one of the most dramatic, if often overlooked, conference championships in 150 years of Michigan athletics.
Ohio State's Jesse Owens had set three world records and tied a fourth, but the 1935 Big Ten Track and Field Championships at Ferry Field came down to the final event, the mile relay, with the Buckeyes holding a half-point lead. OSU had piled up six first-place finishes to two for Michigan -- Widmer Etchells won the discus and Willis Ward tied for first in the high jump. Ward scored one of U-M's three second-place finishes with a career-best 25 feet, 1-1/2 inches in the broad jump, still a foot and a half short of Owens' world record leap. A raft of third-, fourth- and fifth-place finishes from a deep Wolverine squad kept Michigan in contention.
A crowd of 10,000 watched as the mile relay teams took their mark. Fred Stiles led off for Michigan and ran even with Iowa's Eugene Skinner but lost the lead in the exchange. Harvey Patton seized the lead on the second turn of his lap, and Frank Aikens stretched it in the third leg. Anchorman Stan Birleson (pictured) held off a challenge from Northwestern's Sunny Hegg to give Michigan the race in a conference-record 3:15.2. Ohio State finished out of the running in the relay, and Michigan claimed the conference title, 48-43.5.
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Ray Fisher's Baseball Scorebooks
3/22/2016 - Baseball has always been a numbers game. Players, managers and fans compiled statistics and computed averages to record achievements, to compare players, or just for the fun of it. For a good part of Michigan baseball history, the source for those numbers can be found in the Ray Fisher scorebooks in the Athletic Department Records at the Bentley Historical Library. From Fisher's first season in 1921 to his retirement in 1958, the scorebooks tell the stories of some of his great teams and players. Above (and in the PDF linked below) is the top of a 1928 sheet that shows U-M sealing the Big Ten title with a 13-9 win at Ohio State and Bennie Oosterbaan having a pretty good game. The big first baseman went 4-for-4 with a home run, a triple, two singles, a walk and three runs scored. The scorebooks continue through the career of coach Don Lund and into Moby Benedict's. A page from the 1962 scorebook (page 2 of PDF linked below) shows how U-M beat Santa Clara to capture the College World Series title. Before 1921 U-M's baseball stats have to be gleaned from articles and boxscores in yearbooks, The Michigan Daily and its predecessors, or the Michigan Alumnus Magazine.
 Pages from 1928 and 1962 Scorebooks
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Hutch's 500th Win
3/15/2016 - With roses from her Wolverines, Michigan head softball coach Carol Hutchins celebrated her 500th win -- an 8-0, five-inning decision against Wright State on March 23, 1997, in West Lafayette, Indiana. Sara Griffin starred in the contest, going 2-for-2 from the plate with two doubles, two runs batted in and two runs scored, while pitcher Jamie Gillies tossed a complete-game one-hitter. Through March 14, 2016, Hutchins is at 1,452 career wins and is the second-winningest coach in NCAA softball history, just five wins shy of record holder Margie Wright (1,457).
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Laying the Ground for Michigan Athletics
3/8/2016 - When Lorenzo "Tommy" Thomas began working as the athletics groundskeeper in 1899, his main tools were a horse and wagon and shovels and rakes. With them he maintained the combined football field, baseball diamond and running track on Regents Field. In 1903 he began laying tile to drain the swampy sections of newly acquired north Ferry Field and put in the football turf for Ferry Field in 1906. Thomas constructed a new baseball diamond in 1908 and then had to move it a bit to the west in 1923 to make room for Yost Field House. His masterwork was laying the turf at Michigan Stadium in 1927 and overseeing the building of U-M Golf Course in 1930. Thomas was supervisor of the athletic grounds and lived in the groundskeeper's house on Ferry Field (in the background in the photo) until his death in 1946. He was a pillar of the staffs that have supported 150 years of athletic competition.
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Watch: 1886 Baseball Team Photo
3/1/2016 - Bentley Historical Library archivist Greg Kinney takes a look at the 1886 Michigan baseball team photo and explains the measures Dianna Samuelson and the conservation lab take to preserve such pieces of history.
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Singles Champ MacKay Leads U-M to National Title
2/23/2016 - Barry MacKay became Michigan's first NCAA men's tennis singles champion in 1957, also guiding the Wolverines to their only national championship in program history that same season. MacKay knocked off Sammy Glammalva of Texas in five sets (6-4, 3-6, 6-2, 3-6, 6-3) to push Michigan past Tulane, 10-9, in the team standings. MacKay was crowned the NCAA singles champion and teamed with Dick Potter for a runner-up finish in the doubles championship. MacKay earned All-America honors as well that season, becoming the first Wolverine to earn the distinction.
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The Beginning of a Dynasty
2/16/2016 - Prior to Bev Plocki taking control of the women's gymnastics program in 1990, Michigan had won only one Big Ten title in eight years since the conference officially sanctioned the sport. Since then, though, no other team has been better. To say that the Wolverines have dominated the conference would be a massive understatement, as Plocki has guided the program to 20 crowns in 26 years. The dynasty began with this 1992 squad that defeated Penn State for the title, 191.700-190.900, in East Lansing, Michigan. That team featured a pair of Big Ten individual champions in Beth Wymer (all-around, uneven bars, floor exercise) and Ali Winski (balance beam). Wymer, who still remains one of the best gymnasts in program history, was also named Big Ten Gymnast and Freshman of the Year, while Plocki was named Big Ten Coach of the Year. That team started it all, because in the last 24 years, the program has Big Ten title-winning streaks of seven (1999-2005), six (1992-97) and five (2007-11).
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Michigan's First National Champion
2/9/2016 - Fred Bonine (Med. 1886) dominated the campus Field Day track events in the mid-1880s and at one time held 10 campus track and field records. Bonine (near lane in the photo) won the 100-yard dash at the Intercollegiate Association Championships at the Manhattan Athletic Club grounds in 1885, beating runners from Harvard and Columbia in the final and giving him claim to being U-M's first national champion. After studying in Europe, Bonine returned to his hometown of Niles, Michigan, and set up an eye clinic above the corner drugstore that became internationally famous, if somewhat controversial. He charged all patients, including celebrities like Jack Dempsey, the same fee -- $2 for the first visit and $1 for subsequent visits -- and regularly saw more than 200 patients a day.
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Michigan's Olympic Stowaways
2/2/2016 - Six of coach Cliff Keen's wrestlers participated in the 1928 U.S. Olympic trials held in Grand Rapids. Robert Hewitt (123 pounds) and Ed Don George (heavyweight) qualified for the U.S. team and finished fifth and fourth, respectively, in their weight classes at the Amsterdam Olympic Games. Al Watson and Russ Sauer are sometimes listed as alternates on the U.S. wrestling team. Though they were in Amsterdam, it was hardly in an official capacity. Both men had wrestled well in U.S. trials, but neither made the 14-man squad; Watson lost to eventual gold medal winner Allie Morrison. Deciding the Olympics was too good an opportunity to miss, the pair hitchhiked to New York and stowed away on the ship transporting the entire U.S. Olympic delegation. They managed to remain undetected, and even worked out with the wrestling team, until the games were over. Discovered at last and out of money, they were forced to earn their passage home by working in the ship's galley. Sauer wrote an entertaining account of his adventure for The Detroit News (November 11, 1928). Their adventure is preserved in the Cliff Keen Scrapbooks at the Bentley Historical Library.
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Future Olympians Set Swimming Relay Records
1/26/2016 - At the 2004 NCAA Men's Swimming and Diving Championships in Long Island, N.Y., the Michigan foursome of future Olympians Peter Vanderkaay (standing), Davis Tarwater (right), Andrew Hurd (left) and Dan Ketchum (in water) made history, setting NCAA, U.S. Open and NCAA Championships records in the 800-meter freestyle relay (7:01.42). The meet was held in short-course meters due to a pending Olympic Games, not short-course yards as has become standard in college swimming. Three of the four men on that relay team went on to become Olympic medalists, including Vanderkaay and Ketchum at the 2004 Games in Athens, Greece, where they won gold in the same event for Team USA. Tarwater earned his relay gold medal at the 2012 Olympics in London, England.
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Women's Gymnastics Becomes a Varsity Sport
1/19/2016 - Women's gymnastics was made a varsity sport in 1975-76 with men's coach Newt Loken guiding the first team. Ann Cornell was hired as head coach from Ann Arbor's Huron High School in the spring of 1976. Among her first recruits was balance beam specialist Linda Watson, whose signature move was a rarely performed one-armed handstand. Here Watson practices the handstand in the Coliseum, with Cornell visible in the background. Watson earned varsity letters in 1977 and 1978. Cornell served as coach for those two seasons, posting a 6-6-0 record with the young team.
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Cazzie's Last Stroll Through Yost
1/12/2016 - For three seasons, 1964-66, Cazzie Russell and his teammates played to packed houses in venerable old Yost Field House. They reached the NCAA finals in 1964 and 1965 and made Michigan basketball the hottest ticket in town.
Yost had been home to Michigan basketball since 1924, but overflow crowds had rarely been a problem. The successes of the "Cazzie Years" made the need for a new basketball facility apparent. In March 1966, Cazzie was photographed by U-M Photo Services taking a last stroll through Yost. Cazzie had played his last game for Michigan, and the raised court had been taken up for the last time. The photos dramatically capture the end of his career and the end of an era in Michigan basketball.
A few months earlier Cazzie had posed for the well-known photo of him in front of the future of Michigan basketball, Crisler Center, "The House that Cazzie Built."
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Michigan's Longest-Tenured Head Coach
1/5/2016 - Cliff Keen served as head coach of the wrestling program for 45 years (1925-70) -- the longest-tenured head coach in Michigan Athletics history. One of five charter members of the National Wrestling Hall of Fame in 1976, Keen had a reputation as a great technician, making champions of students who had no previous wrestling experience. He coached 11 NCAA champions, 68 All-Americans and 81 Big Ten champions over his career. In this photo, one of his most notable wrestlers, 1940 NCAA champion Don Nichols, helps him demonstrate technique in a practice at Yost Field House.
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Marlene Dietrich with (from left) U-M All-Americans Bump Elliott and Bob Chappuis and with James "Buck" Dawson
1947 Football Team Goes Hollywood
12/22/2015 - The photo of international movie star Marlene Dietrich with Bump Elliott, Bob Chappuis and Bruce Hilkene is well known to fans of U-M's 1947 national champion football team. Not so well known is the story behind the photo. James "Buck" Dawson was a raconteur, man-about-campus and 1948 Michiganensian editor, whose college career spanned from 1939 to 1948 with a slight interruption for World War II. Dawson was a glider pilot and paratrooper in the 82nd Airborne. He eventually served as public relations officer for Gen. James Gavin. Among his duties was escorting the German-born Dietrich, a great supporter of the Allied cause, through occupied Berlin, striking up a lasting friendship. When U-M made it to the 1948 Rose Bowl, Dawson used his connections to help arrange a visit for the team to visit the Hollywood set of "Foreign Affair," directed by Billy Wilder and starring Dietrich.
Dawson had a long, if mostly unofficial, connection to U-M Athletics. He ran track 1940-42 but did not win a varsity letter. He was back at U-M in 1954 and married Rosemary Mann Corson, daughter of swimming coach Matt Mann, helped her establish the all-girls Ann Arbor Swim Club, and worked at Matt Mann's Ak-O-Mak and Chikopee swimming camps. He was also the first director of the International Swimming Hall of Fame in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. The joke was he couldn't swim.
For more on Dawson and the 1948 Rose Bowl, including his bet with Humphrey Bogart, see Michigan Today's 1996 story.
• The Adventures of Buck Dawson '43, '48, '54 (Michigan Today)
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Watch: Rare 1901 Football Banquet Program
12/15/2015 - A student scrapbook assembled by football and track competitor Milo White (1898-1902) includes one of three known 1901 Football Banquet Programs complete with autographs from the legendary team.
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A Legend That Almost Wasn't: Albert Wistert and Cliff Keen
12/8/2015 - The Wistert brothers are Michigan football legends. Francis (1931-33), Albert (1940-42) and Alvin (1947-49) all played tackle, wore No. 11, and earned All-America honors. But it might not have happened without an assist from wrestling coach Cliff Keen, who was also an assistant football coach. After the 1941 football season Albert Wistert ran into financial and academic difficulties and football coach and athletic director Fritz Crisler advised that he leave school. When Keen needed a mid-season replacement for heavyweight John Greene, he invited Al to join the mat squad. Wistert debuted in a meet with Nebraska, apparently much to the surprise and delight of the Yost Field House crowd. He lost that match but posted a 2-4 record with a fourth-place finish in the Big Ten. More importantly, Keen and the wrestling team helped Wistert "find myself" when Crisler "and everyone else was down on me." Following the season Wistert wrote an appreciative note to Keen, who had left campus for service with the Navy. The letter and clippings on Wistert's little-known wrestling career are preserved in the Cliff Keen scrapbooks at the Bentley Library. Albert "Ox" Wistert returned to win the football team MVP award and All-America honors in 1942 and went on play nine seasons with the Philadelphia Eagles.
? Wistert's Letter to Cliff Keen
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The start of a 1908 cross country race at Waterman Gym
Hares and Hounds and the Cross Country Club
12/1/2015 - As early as 1886 the Chronicle student newspaper was promoting the formation of a "Hares and Hounds" club on campus. The sport, in which lead runners (the "hares") started off and left a paper trail that the "hounds" followed, had become popular at eastern colleges. The Chronicle writer thought "it would be great sport to make the route from here to Ypsi or Whitmore Lake and close with a dinner at the rendezvous." There is no record of campus races until the mid-1890s, but the hare and hound races did lead to the forming of a Cross Country Club in 1901. The club sponsored a fall and spring race with the winner later getting his name inscribed on the Harpham Trophy and the top runners awarded the "C-C-C" monogram. Gayle Dull placed second and the team fifth of nine in the club's first national competition at the 1908 Intercollegiate Cross Country Race at Princeton.
The Cross Country Club was the training ground for Michigan's great two- and four-mile relay teams that dominated the Penn Relays from 1904 to 1910. Cross country became a varsity sport in 1919.
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First Varsity Women's Soccer Team
11/24/2015 - In 1994, soccer became the 13th women's sport at the University of Michigan. Under the direction of head coach Debbie Belkin (became Debbie Rademacher in 2000), the inaugural team consisted of 10 freshmen, nine sophomores, one junior and four seniors. In that first season, Michigan had one of Belkin's 10 seasons with double-digit wins, going 10-7-2 overall. One of the team's 10 freshmen, Debbie Flaherty from Sutton, Massachusetts, became Michigan's first All-Big Ten selection, being named to the second team. Flaherty recorded four goals and seven assists as a freshman, including the program's first goal in the 109th minute of its first match to help U-M tie Wisconsin-Green Bay, 1-1. When that inaugural freshman class was seniors (1997), they helped Michigan to one of the winningest seasons, advancing to the NCAA Tournament for the first time in program history and finishing with an 18-4-1 record.
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1895 Players who faced Harvard (from left): Forrest Hall, James Baird, Bert Carr, James Hooper
James Baird: Quarterback and Builder
11/17/2015 - James Baird is considered the greatest Michigan quarterback of the 19th century. The diminutive 5-foot-6, 147-pound engineering student was captain the 1894 Wolverine that posted a 9-1-1 record, including a 12-4 win over Cornell, the first victory for a Western college over one of the big Eastern schools. Baird led Michigan's 1895 squad against mighty Harvard in Cambridge, Massachusetts. The Wolverines lost by a 4-0 score, but many thought they outplayed the Crimson.
The younger brother of Charles Baird, James graduated in 1896 and in 1899 joined the George Fuller Co. in New York City, the largest construction firm in the country. Baird supervised construction of the iconic Flatiron Building, the first structural steel skyscraper in Manhattan. In 1904 he took over Fuller's office in Washington, D.C., where he would build some of the nation's most famous monuments -- the Lincoln Memorial, Arlington Amphitheater, and Tomb of the Unknown Soldier -- as well as landmarks like the Freer Gallery and Folger Library. Baird later formed his own firm whose projects included Martha Cook Dormitory and Hutchins Hall on the U-M campus.
Next time you are in the Big Apple, the nation's capital, or on State Street or South U, take a moment to admire the work of a former Wolverine.
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World War II Physical Training at Ferry Field
11/10/2015 - In the early days of World War II, the overall physical fitness of the campus was called into question. In February 1942, an Army ROTC instructor wrote a critical letter to University of Michigan officials deploring the lack of physical conditioning among the students, accusing universities of fostering a "hot-house, indoor, flabby manhood" that created "athletic lounge lizards." These conditions, the instructor noted, required the military to lengthen their preliminary training.
Director of athletics Fritz Crisler responded by devising a comprehensive body-hardening course, "Physical Education for Men" or PEM. The course required every man not physically incapacitated to take four and a half hours a week of individual and group exercises, including running an obstacle course set up on Ferry Field. Among the eight obstacles were a seven-foot wooden wall, a 30-inch tunnel five feet long, a nine-foot water jump, and a rope climb. Every man also had to pass a swimming test. Crisler and his staff received accolades from the armed forces for their physical training program.
 Tomorrow's Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen Are Toughened Up (The Michigan Alumnus)
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Football: "To the best of his knowledge and ability"
10/27/2015 - Fielding Yost (middle back in above photo of 1901 team) was named Michigan's football coach in February 1901. Yost spent a few days on campus in April and returned for fall practice in early September, but he didn't actually sign a contract until Oct. 4, a week after U-M defeated Albion 50-0. The one-page contract called for U-M to pay Yost a $2,300 salary and required him to coach the team "to the best of his knowledge and ability" beginning in September "and continuing until the last game is played."
Yost's first team posted an 11-0 record, outscored opponents 550-0, and defeated Stanford, 49-0, in the first Tournament of Roses game. Yost, who coached for 25 years (1901-23, 1925-26) and went on to become director of athletics (1921-41), received a $450 raise in his next contract, a three-year deal -- and another one-page document -- covering the 1902-04 seasons.
The Yost contracts are of special significance because, in a sense, much of U-M's athletic success and tradition can be traced to those one-page documents. The Yost contracts are found in records of the Board in Control of Intercollegiate Athletics at the Bentley Historical Library. The Board in Control records consist of 52 linear feet of material dating from 1896 to 1997, including correspondence, subject files, minutes and photographs. They are an essential source for documenting a large part of Michigan's 150 years of athletic competition.
 Fielding Yost Contracts (1901-02)
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Ice Hockey Gets a New Home
10/20/2015 - In the summer of 1973, following the suggestion of U-M baseball coach Don Lund, the University of Michigan began a renovation project to convert Yost Field House into Yost Ice Arena. With the men's basketball team six years removed from calling Yost its home after the construction of Crisler Arena in 1967, and with football having moved to Oosterbaan Field House in 1970, the time was right for ice hockey to make the move from Weinberg Coliseum. The hockey team had played at Weinberg, on the intersection of Fifth Avenue and Hill Street, since its inception as a program in 1923, but the building's life span as an ice rink had run its course. Michigan hired Charles R. Beltz and Co., a mechanical firm from Detroit and one of the largest builders of ice-making equipment in the world, to create the ice rink, which was completed shortly before the start of the 1973-74 season. Michigan played its first home game at Yost Ice Arena on Nov. 2, 1973, defeating Waterloo Lutheran, 6-2, with Gary Morrison scoring twice to lead the Wolverines.
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Watch: Student Scrapbooks at the Bentley
10/6/2015 - Student scrapbooks from the late 1800s and early 1900s, such as one at the Bentley Historical Library compiled by football and track competitor Milo White (1898-1902), help reveal what student life was like during the time period.
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Football: "I know damn well I will!"
9/29/2015 - Tom Harmon left no doubt about his commitment to the Michigan football team when he answered coach Fritz Crisler's questionnaire to prospective players in the summer of 1939, prior to Harmon's junior year. It is one of hundreds of responses preserved in the Herbert Orin Crisler papers at the Bentley Historical Library.
"Do you honestly think you can make every sacrifice necessary to put yourself in the best physical condition, the best mental condition, the best spiritual condition to produce the best that is in you for each game," reads the final question. To which Harmon declared: "I know damn well I will!"
Harmon's response is a little more emphatic than most, but it is indicative of a special loyalty and friendship that developed between player and coach. Crisler had the reputation of being a rather aloof personality who didn't develop close personal relationships with many of his players, some of whom referred to their coach as "the Lord." Harmon was an exception. Crisler became almost a second father to Harmon, a close relationship that would last a lifetime.
The evidence can be found in various items at the Bentley Library, including an autographed photo from Tom to Fritz ("In sincere appreciation for all you have done - my best wishes always to not only the greatest coach in the world but also the greatest guy - Ole '98' will take you as the All American coach every day") and 1979 photos of Tom and his old coach for Michigan Stadium at ceremonies marking the 100th anniversary of college football.
 Tom Harmon 1939 Football Questionnaire
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Football: Abner Howell
9/22/2015 - Students of Michigan athletics know that there were no African-American football letterwinners during Fielding Yost's tenure as coach (1901-26). Many assume there were no black players at all. But there is Abner Howell in a full squad photo of the 1902 team, kneeling just to the right of Yost (back row, third from left).
Howell was a star all-around high school athlete in Salt Lake City, Utah. He came to Ann Arbor determined to earn a law degree and play football. He won a freshman numeral in 1902. The Michigan Daily took note of his efforts in practice, reporting he had been elevated to scrimmage against the varsity. Howell tried out for the varsity team in 1903 and 1904 but never got into a game, and his name does not appear in the football record books.
Financial difficulties put an end to Howell's law school dreams. He returned to Salt Lake City and took up his father's trade as a bricklayer. Howell's family had a long and complicated relationship with the Mormon Church. Abner eventually joined the church and achieved the unofficial status of "honorary High Priest." Howell died in 1966 in Salt Lake City.
Brigham Young University historian Margaret Young provides the details of Abner Howell's fascinating story, one of the most improbable in 150 years of Michigan athletics.
 Abner Leonard Howell: Honorary High Priest (by Margaret Blair Young)
At least two other African-Americans played football under Yost. An unidentified black player appears in a 1917 team photo. Belford Lawson won "reserve letters" in 1921 and 1922.
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Field Hockey in the Early 1900s
9/15/2015 - Twenty-two years after women were first admitted to the university, U-M began offering classes in physical education for women in 1894. In response to the concern regarding physical stamina, colleges and universities developed programs of "physical training" to monitor and promote the health of their women students. Among the early offerings were tennis, basketball, gymnastic games, bicycling and field hockey, as depicted in this 1905 photograph. Physical education remained compulsory for both men and women throughout most of the university departments until 1969. Field hockey was one of the "original six" varsity sports for women established for the 1973-74 academic year.
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Barbour Gymnasium for Women
9/1/2015 - The University of Michigan began offering classes in physical education for women in 1894, with Barbour Gymnasium for women being completed in the coming years. Barbour Gymnasium, which was attached to the north side of Waterman Gymnasium, was a key facility for women on campus at the time. It served as both a social event center and a place to exercise. This is a photo of women playing basketball at Barbour in the early 1900s. Women's basketball was not established as a varsity sport until the 1973-74 season, but that did not stop women from playing the game on campus in the years before Title IX.
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Men's Gymnastics: Arno Lascari
8/25/2015 - The 1963 NCAA champion on parallel bars, Arno Lascari remains the only Wolverine in program history to win a Big Ten parallel bars title in three consecutive seasons. Additionally, he won both high bar and pommel horse in 1963, and he was a member of the 1963 NCAA championship squad as well as a trio of Big Ten championship squads in 1963-65.
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1887 Michigan Football Team
Michigan Teaches Notre Dame Football
8/18/2015 - In 1939, the M Club was going to host a major reunion, and in preparation for that, Fielding Yost asked former student-athletes to recall events of their playing days at Michigan.
Among the responses in the records at the Bentley Historical Library is one from George DeHaven of the 1887 football team. DeHaven and William Harless had attended Notre Dame before enrolling at Michigan in 1886. DeHaven recalls how he became the contact with Notre Dame's Brother Paul to arrange for Michigan to stop in South Bend on the way to a Thanksgiving game in Chicago. In DeHaven's words, "We played gently with them that day in fall 1887 and carefully taught Notre Dame how to play modern football."
DeHaven's letter is just one of many responses to Yost's call that shed light on the early history of Michigan athletics.
 George DeHaven Letter
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A Look at the Bentley Historical Library
