Los Angeles herald., 1907-02-02
ATHLETICS Do NOT
ASSURE LONG LIFE
Relaxation from Exercise Harmful.
Youth Who Works Hard at School
Endangers Health by seden-
tary Habits
Special to The Herald.

hdTy TIdpltS
Special to The Herald.
NEW YORK, Feb. 1.-The subject of
longevity among athletes and other
college students has been investigated
seriously by William G. Anderson, di-
rector of the Yale gymnasium, and he
has come to the conclusion that the ad-
vantage is with the athletes. But
whether this Is due to the mans ORR
ginal strength or to his development as
an athlete, he says, there is nothing to
prove. Discussing the subject in the
Yale Alumni Weekly, he writes:
rs the college athlete q sounder man
in after years and man of longer life
than his nonathletic brother? Statis-
tics prove beyond doubt that the man
in college or out of 1t is better for con-
sistent exercise of some sort. But 1t is
not so certain that the man whose en-
thusiasm for and proficiency in some
sport brings him to the highest recog
milton in his college is correspondingly
benefited
"a great many people claim that the
highly developed athlete has more mus
Gle and more lung power than he can
use when he graduates and takes up
his long apprenticeship in some Sc
dentry occupation. If he is not careful
the very power of lung and heart which
made him a force in the long four-mile
pull, if he be a crew man, becomes al
danger, because there Is no call in his
every day life for the abnormal devel-
opment he acquired in college. If he
does not keep up some pretty vigorous
exercise outside of office hours the lung
tissue developed in his college life falls
into disuse and may be the indirect
cause of consumption, or the heart,
forced to do overwork in the strain of
the competition in the big sports and
overdeveloped, may retaliate in after
life by refusing to do It's work in some
great STRESS like pneumonia, for in
stance.
Conclusions valueIess
so claim the opponents of high ath-
letics. But frequently conclusions OF
this sort are drawn from individual
cases and are of no value.
Records prove that the highly de-
veloped athlete, in spite of the many
notable exceptions which may be quot
ed lives longer than his nonathletic
college mate.
THE figures on longevity of men
for the last fifty-five years are highly
interesting and are a pointer to the
value of specialized athletics. The rec
ord covers the loves of S07 athletes in
the four major sports, beginning with
the crew in 1855, and taking up football,
track and baseball as those games came
to have a place in the college calendar
of outdoor sports.
THE attention is at once arrested by
the fact that among the S07 athletes
who won the distinction of a Y, only
fifty-eight deaths have occurred in the
last half century. When the average
of years in the life of the sport is
struck it is found that the mortality
was greater among football men. Crew
/ t,.n, ,Ir
third and baseball men fourth, with an
extremely low average. Yale athletes
show remarkable longevity compared
with the select mortality tables of the
actuarial society.
Judging from the Investigations, it
| is reasona BILE to say that there Is no un-
due strain put on the athletes while
they are in training, and their later his
tory seems to show they were benefited
rather than harmed.
Less tuberculosis
Consumption was responsible for
twelve of the fifty-eight deaths, but In
the case of athletes the percentage OF
men dying from this cause was not
! greater than the expected deaths
among nonathletes from similar
cause. Arthur Hunter of New York,
high actuary authority, says that
comparison of the causes of death
among athletes and 'mutuals' insured
before 45 years of age does not develop
any Irregularities in the distribution of
deaths. The proportion of deaths
among athletes from tuberculosis was
found to be % per cent to the thousand,
and 'mutuals,' insured below As years,
"a per cent.
Deaths from heart disease in the
Yale list OF fifty-eight men were four
at the ages of 35, 81, 6S and 20. The
average is very low. Pneumonia car
ried off six, typhoid five and typhoid
pneumonia two. Those who wish to
push their argument that high athle-
tics are bad for the lungs and heart
might find some ground for that argu-
ment in the fact that twenty-four Of
the fifty-elght deaths were caused by
lung trouble of various kinds and heart
failure. The table of deaths further
shows that nine of the flfty-eight ath-
letes met violent deaths of which two
were suicides. One died of dissipation
which was not traceable to partlcipa-
tion In athletics.
THE inevitable conclusion from the
figures gathered is that the Yale man
who comes to high honors in the ma
jority of sports in the last half century
has more than the ordinary mans share
of long life. But whether this Is due to
his high development as an athlete or
to the original strength of the man
himself is still unproven and seems
likely to remain so unless some more
perfect means of comparison can be
found|