The herald and news. [volume] (Newberry S.C.) 1903-1937, 1922-12-05
DR.. RIGGS FOOTBALL TALK
ATTRACTS WIDE ATTENTION
Charlotte Observer and The State
Comment Editorially Upon
Address Made
Grccnvillc News.

'Grccnvillc News.
The address Of President ". NJ.
Riggs of Clemson college. before the
Boosters bureau Of the Chamber of
Commerce here last Saturday has at
tracted attention throughout the
South. Dr.. Riggs dccried the influence
athletics are coming to exert on the
colleges.
In an Atlanta newspaper Supt. NJ.
VI Parks Of the Georgia public schools
endorsed Dir. Riggs statement and
declared that football and Other
forms of athletics are monopolizing
the attention Of colleges to the detri-
mont Of their class room work. Dr..
Riggs was correct in saying that foot
ball coaches have supplanted school
teachers, he stated.
The Charlotte Observer commented
on the speech editorially, as follows:
Somebody else seems to be think
ing along the same lines as Major
Heath and Governor Turner. Presi-
dent Riggs of Clemson college ought
to be an admittedly good authority
on what is best for the boys at col
| lege and what is not best for them.
He makes declaration that athletics
! and particularly football, is becoming
entirely too important in present day
collegiate life He was talking at a
meeting of the Greenville Chamber
of Commerce and he proceeded to
elucidate his views in entertaining
manner. President Riggs maintains
that people think too much of the cal
ibre of a football team put out 10y
school ard too little of the curricu-
lum or the degree of training for cit
! izenship It gives young men cf the
country Major Heath had said that
any sort of a robust fellow, showing
football qualifications, could be put
through college, mainly for his ath-
letic attainments and possibilities,
and despite his disqualification for
graduation. while other young men
better equipped than he, would fail
of graduation. President Riggs Is
disturbed and apprehensive over the
extent to which football has sup
planted other school features in the
mind of the public He lays the blame
on the alumni, the newspapers and
the public, for this condition, and for
fact. it would seem that all three
must plead guilty.
The Columbia State also made edi-
torial comment on the address. The
State said:
"The exaggeration of athletics,
football in particular, in college life
is udoubtedly an evil and it applies
! especially to the small colleges. Har-
ward, Yale and Cornell, with their
thousands anu thousands Of students,
are not overshadowed by the games
many of their thousands are seriously
engaged in work and the institution
would not be greatly affected were
they to outlaw football. DR.. Riggs,
president of Clemson, speaks the un-
! happy truth to the Chamber of Com
merce of Greenville when he de-
clares that athletics have come to be
of Importance too absorbing in most
colleges.
"Students and alumni arrive at the
opinion that without a winning team
the college will go to the demnitions.
For winning team maker of WIN
nings teams is needed coach-and
the coach wanted comes high The
public steps in---a great part of which
is wholly Indifferent to the college ex-
cept as an agency for its amusement.
The public will pay the expenses
ana the puOllc uotS, VI Ihe SlSe'1Si
proportion Of them. The game must
be played in the city. Were half the
games played at Clemson or Due
West, the athletic association would
!be bankrupt at the end Of the season.
In Greenville, Columbia, Charleston,
a great part of the people are eager
to buy tickets-not perhaps con-
Sciously but, in fact, they hire col
Ilege to provide entertainment, much
as they hire Joint stock company
to provide them with teams Of pro-
fessional baseball players.
THE football players are not pro-
jfesSionals, they are young gentlemen
who scorn playing for money and
therefore are more interesting by far
than the salaried players Of baseball.
But the college, without knowing it,
comes to be in some sense a Drofes-
sional purveyor of amusement. To be
sure. there is usually q deficit which