Football Daily

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The Father of Modern Football, Walter Camp. The innovator is credited with so many items that are common to football today. We get quite the education on the Father of American Football, Walter Camp, by Roger R. Tamte, who wrote a very in-depth book on Camp, and Roger comes into the Pigpen to share his wealth of knowledge!

In this bonus edition of the Pigskin Daily History Dispatch, we recognize perhaps the most important man in American Football History, Walter Camp, whom many in the last 100 years have called the Father of American Football. There is some controversy and inconsistency as to what day Camp was born, as we will talk about in a moment, but as stated earlier, we are declaring this as Walter Camp Weekend, just the same on Pigskin Dispatch. Helping us in this study of Camp is an expert and the author of an excellent book on the man titled Walter Camp and the Creation of American Football authored by Roger R. Tamte, a scholar of early American football who has studied Camp for many years. Roger Tamte, Welcome to the Pigpen!

In the podcast, we learned a bit about Roger and his background as a retired patent attorney who has always had a deep passion for football history. We then talk about the controversy on when exactly Walter Camp was born on April 7 versus April 17, 1859, as different sources call his birthdate differently. Roger dives deep into clarifying what Walter Camp was entirely responsible for, such as down and distance and other items that we may give him credit for but that may have been in place before Camp, such as scrimmage.