James Hogan Scandal

Back in the early 1900's a player named James Hogan of Yale had some special perks to play ball at the school.

James J. Hogan, sitting on the famous Yale fence 1905, courtesy U.S. Library of Congress

Born in Glenbane, County Tipperary, Ireland, James J. Hogan was a tackle that came to America and played for Yale University  from 1901 to 1904. Hogan was always known to have a smile on his face even while playing with his hard hitting style during contests.  This upbeat demeanor as well as his spirited play for the Eli colors caused his classmates to nickname him “Yale.” Hogan lettered all four years for Yale and was All-America three times as well as the Eli captain in 1904. Yale's record in his four years 43-3-2 per the National Football Foundation's website. The NFF voted James Hogan to enter into their College Football Hall of Fame in 1954.

Walter Camp is a figure pretty well known for fair play and promoting good sportsmanship besides revisiong the rules of Rugby to add items such as scrimmage, down and distance and so many more elements found in the game of football today. However, there are some items in his foootball history a little darker than one might think. An article by Walter Goldstein on the website for the  Hartford Courant points out that the "Father of American Football" in his Book of College Sports stated: 

" "A gentleman never competes for money, directly or indirectly"... all the while controlling a reputed $100,000 (about $2.5 million in today's dollars) slush fund for athletic "tutoring." Yale, like all other competitive football programs, shamelessly imported ringers for key games (no doubt for the "love of the game") who found themselves matriculated at different universities weeks or months later. "

So how does Hogan fit into all of this for the classification of a scandal?

Well, Goldstein points out that James Hogan, did not even start his education at Yale until the age of 25. He is not shown to have paid even one red cent of tuition school, yet lived in a luxurious dorm suite. Hogan along with two of his teammates on the Eli eleven had a money making business of selling score cards at Yale baseball games, a monopoly on them by the way. The happy Irishman was also permitted to be the sole provider of cigarettes on campus for the American Tobacco Co., and earned a hefty commission on every carton.  Goldstein's post states:

"The "Egyptian Deities" and "Turkish Mogul" cigarettes, on sale at Yale's famous watering hole, Mory's, were known as "Hogan's cigarettes.""

There were even more "perks" reported for the Eli ace. Kenneth Shropshire of the Global Sports Matter website in a 2018 article wrote that Hogan also received an all expenses paid vacation to Havana, Cuba for captaining the Yale eleven. Who wouldn't have wanted to escape the North East's weather for that?

It is not totally clear what the intent or knowledge that Walter Camp had on the "privelages" of Mr. Hogan and his lucrative education and football exploits but, you would think he had to be aware of it, and maybe conveniently turned a blind eye to the conduct to keep a star player on the very sucessful early gridiron program. It got to the point where every college program that had alumni and boosters with a little bit extra cash were giving the athletes some benefits of playing for their school. It finally came to a head in 1948 at the NCAA Rules convention when the organization said that enough was enough and set up a mutual agreement of all the member shcols to stop the lucative playing incentives.

The pictures above are from the Library of Congress of Capt. James Hogan, full-length portrait, seated on rail fence, facing front, wearing football his uniform, with the letter "Y" on sweater. And Also Wikimedia Commons' collection and is a photos some 1884 teams taken by unknown photographers. Also the banner contains a pic from a 1905 Yale contest found on Wikimedia Commons.