The Bridgeport evening farmer., 1911-02-23
COST OF ATHLETICS ALMOST SCAND.'L LOUIS
Dean Briggs of Harvard Makes Strong Comment On the Management of College Sports.

Cambridge, Mass, Feb. 22.-The cost of organized athletics IS aim2st scandalous," says Dean Lebaron R.
 Briggs of Harvard University, the Regulation of Athletic Sports, in his report to President Lowell. In the beginning of his report Dean Briggs reviews the achievements of the va riouS athletic teams during the past year, urges that something be done to interest all students in athletic sports. and then discusses the prob lens connected with the business ad-
 ministration of athletics. After de- claring that the cost of organized
 athletics is almost scandalous," Dean Briggs continues:
 In spite of large receipts from base
 ball and enormous receipts from foot
 ball, the Harvard Athletic Associati on after moderate payment toward the permanent improvement of Soldiers Field. can barely meet its bills. The
 almost complete abolition of subscrip-
 men, is a healthy curtailment of our income; the increased outlay for hos pitality to visiting teams is a healthy addition to our expenses; the cost of expert medical aid is duty cheerfully assumed, but some expenses bear and success of our teams, that a sil- ver-mounted bridle bears to good horsemanship.
 Captains, managers and coaches, incline to throw aside equipment that is highly serviceable and almost new and to buy at great expense some- thing wholly new and a shade better: they tend to encourage and exagger- ate fastidiousness in hotel accommo-
 dations, in food, and in clothing; they too often require for themselves and their men such luxuries of the nQnOrfQfinn but the rich can afford. The days when the players bought their own
 uniforms and equipment, and paid their own travelling expenses and doc tors bills. are gone past returning. Shoes and sweaters for players, din- icabs for busy men who steal time to help us without remuneration; these
 things have become necessary, but
 shoes and sweaters to wear once or
 not at all, shoes and sweaters as
 keepsakes. souvenir photographs, tax
 icabs as the sole means of getting about, costly dinners with wines and
 cigars-all to be paid out of the gate
 money-these things belong with that theory of training which furnishes trips as a relief to the overtaxed ner- vous system of the university squads.
 It is things like these that give a handle to the enemy of athletic sports and pamper or even pauperiZe strong men.
 It is pleasant to note that fin 1910
 baseball at Harvard was free from conspicuous discourtesy. Yet through out the country this sport and our sports suffer from low ideals. It is
 these low ideals that are responsible
 for the waste of money in enervating luxury to which have already re-
 ferred. It is they that give rise to the
 practices in baseball, scarcely cred itable among gentlemen. It is they also that have made possible the oc- casional outbreaks, the distrust, and
 the pathetic diplomacy in the rela- ton of what should be noble rivals such as Harvard and Yale. All that
 is needed to lift intercollegiate sport
 beyond the reach of just attack and
 put it where it belongs in physical
 mental and model education, is sim
 ole honesty and common sense