New-York tribune., 1905-08-26
SCHOOL ATHLETICS.
Clean Sport the Rule To-day an IN
terschOLastic Contests.


isfaction on the past school year In no previous
year has sport been clean. and the progress
made is full of encouragement to them Tor even
better results fer the year to come.
Sport in the preparatory and other schools mas
not ESCAPED the faint of professionalism yet the
progress from the conditions of only a few years
ago is appreciable. In many cases the schools
themselves were not entirely responsible for the
fault Encouraged by the example of the great
universities and colleges, coaches and team man.
ayers without the knowledge, much less the
sanction. of the faculties, secured for their
teams youths whose amateur standing was not
above reproach. When the managers have de-
hberately sought such material outside the
student body the bait was not nearly so large
of course, as at the big institutions, but there
are many inducements to be offered a husky
youth, even in preparatory school
A far greater evil affecting the purity of the
amateur status of school games has been the
enthusiastic willingness of team managers to
permit youths who undoubtedly profession
ais. according to the rules of the Amateur Ath-
letc Union, TO compete. These youths are bona
fde members of the schools and because of the
lax system of investigation into their previous
appearances and their method of spending vaca-
tlons. compete with pure amateurs without pro-
test, to the great disadvantage of the amateur
These evils are being remeded slowly and
surely. Probably the one agent to deserve the
greatest credit for this steady improvement has
been the Amateur Athletic Union. Practically
no attention had been paid ten years ago to the
danger of professionalism in the preparatory
schools. Strangely enough the work of cleans
ing athletics in these schools began, not in these
institutions themselves, of them the most
exclusive in the country, but on the East
Side The movement for cleaner sport in the
secondary schools and that for public play
grounds and athletic fields for the East Side
tenement children had the same root
Fairgrounds were obtained here and there, and
the work of the youngsters was carefully watched
by the Metropolitan Association of the Amateur
Athletic Union Games were held under its
auspices and great efforts were made to impress
the boys with the necessity, even as children, of
retaining their amateur status unsullied. The
association never took the position that there
was anything diScreditable in being a pro-
fessional, but it did try to impress on the
boys the line of demarcation that must be
drawn of necessity between amateur and pro-
fessional sports. Sport for sports sake" was
the lesson continually dinned into their ears,
often with discouraging lack of results.
Now the schoolboys know better. They have
learned that it is better to pass by the forbidden
pleasures if they expect to attend one of the
famous preparatory schools colleges. The
boy who leaves the school, if he is at all pro-
fciert in sport wants to join an athletic club.
ana he knows that the slightest deviation from
the straight and narrow path of clean amateur
srort will debar him from the pleasure of COM
pet:ng in any amateur event for his school, club
or college.
The association watches the boys of grammar
schools with an eagle eye: for, John Stein. of
the registration committee of the Metropolitan
Association. said a few days ago:
nqrr fud hoy off "a ne gar G.
some club picnic, play on one of the many
ser professional ball teams of this city when
they are young. there is holding them back
when they grow older. The grammar school
10y who enters a contest of any sort with
rrofes sional at the chowder party of the Rain
sov Social Club, say, and gets away with it, is
he boy we find the ball team of his school
)r college who earns his board and lodging
during his vacation by playing on the bah team
name"
Professional coaches for the baseball and
football teams giving way more and more
to alumni coaching, TO the betterment of the
spcrt. The decrease of professional coaching
has come about largely through the spread
among the alumni and faculty of the English
idea that and teams turned out by that
but only the highly trained and specialized
pupils of professional coach.
In one sport the preparatory schools have
shown the way to the universities and that is
rowing. Two New-Engiand schools the only