Plucky Harvard Men of 1885 Saved Football

The following notice appeared in the CRIMSON on Monday, October 5, 1885:

"A meeting for all those interested in foot-ball will be held in Holden Chapel, Wednesday evening, Oct. 7th, at 7:30. All who care for the preservation of the game are earnestly requested to be present, as it is of the utmost importance that something definite be decided at once. If the meeting is not well attended, the management will know that the college does not care to keep up the game, and Harvard's entire resignation will be sent into the Intercollegiate Convention and no further steps will be taken to revive the game. So all who care for the continuance of the game must give it the support of their presence at the meeting. M. M. Kimball."

In the same issue an editorial said in part:

If the game of foot-ball is not to be given up for good and all; the college must bestir itself at once, and show its desire to have the sport continue to be a prominent feature in Harvard athletics...The only thing to be done is to organize class elevens...From these teams a fairly strong 'varsity eleven may be picked to play the Canadian teams, and thus the foot-ball spirit may be kept alive until the cloud of faculty disapproval, which now rests above the sport, shall be removed.

"No better fall sport has over been desire than foot-ball, and its abandonment by the college cannot fall to be taken as an indication of the wane of that spirit of pluck and hardihood which has characterized the Harvard Undergraduate of the past."