RIGOROUS DISCIPLINE

Being soldiers, their first insistence had been absolute discipline. Dartmouth football had needed some. It received same pronto and with no wastage of words when a player broke training in the good oldfashioned way. With no pyrotechnics, at all, he was ordered to turn in his equipment. There was no recourse and nosoftening of the penalty, and he was a pretty good football player, too. "We don't play football at Dartmouth that way," was all the coach said.

That lad came back the next year to play one of the greatest seasons of football I ever saw a Dartmouth player deliver. He hasn't touched a drop of liquor since the night of his early 1934 season defection. You couldn't choke one down him today although he's now an alumnus, and he'd swing an anvil-sized fist against any jaw that criticized Earl Blaik. Theirs turned into a very fine friendship, for after the penalty was paid, the crime was never again mentioned.

Those Pointers were teaching something else besides how to block and tackle, and although they didn't give the College a plenitude of victories that first season, they did give it back something infinitely more precious—that spirit, that nexus, you and I have all felt, the one the song means when it says: .... "Dartmouth, bless her name. Whether in defeat or victory, we are loyal just the same!"

Then came the next year!

Norwich, Vermont, Bates and Brown were belted out in double digits: 39, 42, 59 and 41. Picture 41-0 over Brown, ye of ancient days! Bates alone scored. Dave Morey's lads amassed seven points.

Harvard was unhorsed 14-6, the Green rolling up 17 first downs to Harvard's one and rushing 279 yards to Harvard's 79.

And the next week came the end of 51 years' endeavor—Dartmouth's first victory over Yale!

There's no point in dwelling upon that event. Every Dartmouth man the world remembers the thrill, and several thousands of us have splinters of those goal posts framed in our dens or offices. Mine's a good big chunk, autographed by the team. I wasn't there. They sent it to me. I wouldn't sell it for a million dollars, but I'd like to borrow a quarter, if anybody has one to spare.