Evening public ledger. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1914-1942, 1920-11-04
WEST POINT SXS TEN
OFATHLETICS IDEAL
Conplete Ans,cer to old Charge That Only Specialists
Get Chance-Cadets Instructed in a Dozen different
,Sports-AH Must Take Part
Rv GRANTLAND RICE


ONCE in a rare while a perfect but
" impossible dream suddenly comes
true.
A perfect but hitherto impossible
dream has suddenly come true at West
Point.
It is the perfection Of the finest ath-
letic system ever put forward at any
institution in the world-a complete
answer to the old charge that under
our modern system only few select
chance at our various sports.
We have had systems of compulsory
athletics and compulsory gymnasium
work before.
But they have always been incom-
plete. Forty or fifty or sixty might
play football or the same number might
play baseball.
But so per cent of the students play
cd neither, except at spasmodic inter-
vals.
When a man leaves West Point now,
do you know what different games each
individual will have been taught to
play-what games each individual will
have learned within ut least fair
amount OF thoroughness!
Here are few: Football, baseball,
soccer. lacrosse. tennis, boxing .wrest-
ling, fencing. rowing, track athletics.
There you have the soul of the new
West Point system IN q few lines:
To ground each cadet in the rudi-
ments of twelve or fourteen leading
sports, to make these sports compulsory
for every man at the Point, and there:
by, in place Of developing few. special
stars. to develop the greatest collec-
ton of all-around athletes in all train
ing history.
The Big Advance
OTHER institutions have tried out the
" plan of making each mnn take Nm
some sport. The result was a collection
Of specialists.
Here we have each man taking up
every sport in the course of his work
and all under competent instruction,
Here each man is grounded in the
fundamentals Of each sport first and
then put into active competition later
on.
He may know nothing about foot
ball, baseball, lacrosse or soccer when
he enters the academy. He may not
like these games or he may think that
he Is not physically built to play them.
But he hasn't any choice when this
reQuisition reaches each company COM
mander:
"Send today twenty football players,
twenty soccer players, fifteen lacrosse
players, ten tennis players, fifteen base
ball players"
The truck rolls up for these men
the equipment Is ready-and short
while later you can see 600 men playing
football and 400 men playing soccer or
lacrosse.
No one is let out. The star football
player must take the full athletic course
just rs the others do. He will not leave
the Point as any football or baseball
specialist. He will leave fully equipped
to play or direct twelve or fourteen
leading games.
Meeting the Impossible
|ONLY a perfect directing organization
" with a perfect system could have
made this possible.
Fortunately the military academy had
the two rare geniuses needed to carry
this plan Acknowledgement Douglas
Macarthur and Colonel Herman J. Koch
Ter, two men out Of a century for the
work.
General Macarthur, who at one time
commanded the Forty second Division
in France, Is brilliant officer, blessed
with youth, brains, ability and the
knack of leadership. He is a practical
man with vision, an enthusiast who
refuses to be stopped by any barrier.
Colonel Koehler is the officer who d.
rected the physical training of 25O, 900
officers and enlisted men during the
World War. He has no equal at this
work. In addition to being master
at detail, his enthusiasm for the idea
was also unbounded. And when you
get two practical enthusiasts on a Job,
with such assistants as Major Phil
Hayes and Lieutenant Elmer Oliphant,
there can be only one answer.
That answer will be 1000 men this
year who will have a better groundwork,
better foundation, in the way of all.