Football Fanciers

College football tends to breed a nasty atmosphere of suspicion. Athletic scholarships and competitive recruiting exist; the colleges know this and so do their alumni. But the conflict between the standards people would like to see applied to athletics and actual standards makes for a narrowing of the eyes and a quick search between the lines when a school changes its athletic or admissions policy. There were many people squinting between the lines at the College during the vacation.

Causing all the fuss were the activities of two reasonably divergent organizations; the Visiting Committee on Athletic Sports, and the new Undergraduate Schools Committee. The Visiting Committee had secretly resigned after the Yale game and the story leaked out after Christmas; the result was a flurry of newspaper stories implying that local athletic policy was being shaken up "from the top down" and that this meant Harvard football was going professional. Actually, the shake-up was very little more than an attempt to get more active alumni working for the committee.

The Schools Committee had sent its members on a more or less experimental basis to visit Harvard Clubs in the South and West; it wanted nothing more than to persuade more and better students--all kinds of students--to apply to Harvard. But the Committee had worked closely with the Varsity Club men. A surprising number of people reacted, many vociferously, by condemning the committee as a recruiting organization.

In both cases, the fear of "professionalism" could block some needed work. In both cases, reading between the lines was blurring a clear and useful text.