Pro Football Rises

In this edition of the Football History Rewind, we take a look at Professional Football's genesis and rise in the 1890s.

Courtesy Wikipedia Commons collection of John Brallier in his 1895 Washington and Jefferson football attire.

For almost 80 years the thought that John Brallier was the first paid football player in 1895. On Septmeber 3 of that year if you remember Brallier was paid $10 plus expenses to play for the Latrobe Athletic Association¹. Latrobe's starting quarterback Eddie Blair had a prior commitment to play in a baseball game, so his Latrobe club approached the 17 year old Brallier, that was about to start school at Washington and Jefferson College¹ to play in his place. Brallier was reluctant as he did not want to get injured before starting a promising college career, so Latrobe made it worth his while. The Latrobe team won 12-0 over the rival Jeanette Athletic Association and Brallier went on to have a great season at W&J, while also playing a few more game for Latrobe too. The next season after fielding offers from multiple colleges and clubs to play ball, he settled on playing for West Virginia University. After only a few games for the Mountaineers he left the team due to what he described as "financial difficulties" of the school not taking care of players and returned to Latrobe to coach and quarterback the club.

Courtesy Wikimedia Commons, In 1895, Latrobe, Pennsylvania formed one of the earliest professional football teams. This image of the inaugural team is well known and can be found in various books about early football.

There were always rumors and even newspaper articles from 1892 however that claimed a trio of players in the November 12, 1892 Pittsburgh Athletic Club versus the Allegheny Athletic Association were paid for their services in what ended up being an exhibition game, just prior to kick off due to the accusations by PAC that AAA was paying the three players. The trio in question were Ed Malley, Sport Donnelly and Pudge Heffelfinger.

Shortly after the Pro Football Hall of Fame in Canton, Ohio opened in 1963 a paper document often referred to as the "Birth Certificate of Professional Football" was obtained by the historians at the HOF and put on display. The doc was an expense record of the Allegheny Athletic Association from 1892. On the page it clearly shows debits and credits of the November 12, 1892 game including a line that says "William Heffelfinger for playing (cash)$500.00." An earlier line in the November 12 entry says that $75.00 was accrued for Donnelly, Hefflefinger and Malley via a check for their expenses. The smoking gun had finally surfaced in a controversy where most of the parties at that point were no longer with us.

The Pro Football Hall of Fame's website claims that now John Brallier is in fact the seventh player in history to have been proven to be paid.

1. William Pudge Heffelfinger $500 plus expenses by AAA on November 12, 1892
2. Ben Sport Donnelly $250 plus expenses by AAA on November 19, 1892
3. Peter Wright $50 per game by AAA for the 1893 season
4. James Van Cleve $50 per game by AAA for the 1893 season
5. Oliver Rafferty $50 per game by AAA for the 1893 season
6. Lawson Fiscus $20 per game for the 1894 season by the Greensburg Athletic Association 
7. John Brallier $10 plus expenses by Latrobe Athletic Association for a game on September 3, 1895.

Gregg Ficery author of Gridiron Legacy: Pro Football's Missing Origin Story , starts his story in parrallel as his great grandfather, Bob Shiring was playing football near Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania for the Homestead Athletic Club and later the Pittsburgh Pros. Shiring played in what many consider the first Professional World Championship games of the gridiron in the late 1890's and early 1900's as his Pittsburgh area squads matched up against the best pro teams of that era including a tough Philly team and their star, the former Penn Quaker legend, Blondy Wallace. A few years later Pennsylvania pro football lost some popularity and transferred to nearby Ohio.

The picture in the banner above is from the Wikipedia Commons collection of John Brallier in his Washington and Jefferson football attire.