The Bridgeport evening farmer., 1916-03-29
.CRITICISES YALE
 FOR ATTITUDE ON NUMBERING ELEVEN

On the question of the numbering of football players at Yale as that taken
 by this paper, Lawrence Ferry, Wr1t-
 ing in the New York Evening Post
 last night has some exceedingly in
 teresting and pointed things to say in
 answer to the recent editorial in the
 Yale News touching upon the subject
 of mum mbering.
 Says MT. Perry:
 '.In commenting upon the decision
 of the Yale football eleven--as an nounced by Captain sBIack-not to wear numbers, the Yale News takes stand upon an ideal which, unfortu- nately,. does not Square with facts as they exist. The disingenuous cry of the athletic writer who argues that the numbering of players should be effected is hardly so disingenuous as the arguments of Captain Black, the Yale News, ct al, in favor of allowing players to rest under cover of anony- rnity, as far as the great majority of spectators are concerned Says the News:
 t'The announcement that the mem bers of the University football team. will not be numbered in the games next fall settles satisfactorily, so far as Yale is concerned, a question which has been agitated for some while. The plea, and not infrequently the demand for numbering players has come chief 1y from sporting editors, who have been actuated in their requests prfn- cipaAly because such. system would be very much to their own advantage in reporting the games. Of course, better, in the sense of more accurate, not of wider, publicity, should be giv-. en to all forms of college athletics; but let US not forget that games are played for the college, not for the sporting editors; for Yale, and not for the general pubIic.''
 ,o4 oi1I1 nice thing to do let us examine this time-stained theory that games are played for the college < for Yale, and not for the general public.'' Every one, then, who follows college sports at all closely knows that at least one game, football is not played for the college-' The <gridiron pastime has passed that phase, and has assumed a far deeper than the mere playing of the game.
 At Yale, Harvard and inceton-to select three schools where football has it's highest sanction in point of graduate support and financial out lay-the rearing of walls of concrete amphitheaters, vie with the academic buildings in fmpressiveness, as in cost of struction-outward symbols of a, phase Qe extra-curricular activity which are striking in their suggestive ness.
 Looking further, we find staffs of salaFied specialists with sole duty and lying in the production of teams whose qualifications for play are such as to insure each year the filling of the stadium with throngs 1 ranging 35 to 80,000 spectators, and, | finally, business organizations whose | financ cial sheets suggest the activity of banking institutions.
 The report of the Yale Athletic as- | sociation, which lies before me as I ] eI,a ,of f50oJ ending September 1, 1914, cost $55, ,145. .64 | this of course, does not include the l initial expenditures on the costly 0owl-and that the recefps were $81,- '52. 32. It has been estimated that Yale received the high-water mark sum of i ;115 ,00O from the sale of tickets last all.
 The total receipts from the 55,750 tickets sold for the YaIe-Princeton same were about $111, 500; the receipts rom the 47,0O0 tickets to the Yale game, $94 4,0O0; from the Yale. Brown game the receipts were about 10, 600, and from the six preliminary yames of the season about $16, GOO; making the total receipts of the season nearly a quarter of a million-or, to oe exact, $231. 800. The inference of tI this is obvious. Football has been developed into great financial pro- lucer at Yale, as elsewhere.
 It supports many sports which are either productive, or nearly so; 1t funds for the maintenance of plants; football, Fowtng-dn- part ]