Schedule

Course Piazza site

Week 1, January 22: Were things better in the past?
Readings: The College Athlete, by Henry Beech Needham. McClure's Magazine. Part I: June 1905.

Week 2, January 29: American sports before football
Readings: Smith, Chapters I-IV. The College Athlete, by Henry Beech Needham. McClure's Magazine. Part II: July 1905. Kenneth C.Davis,Schools of Hard Knocks, NYT.

Review of sources: Crimson, other newspapers, Presidents' Reports, Sibley's Private Journal

Week 3, February 5: MEET AT HARVARD ARCHIVES, PUSEY LIBRARY. How to do archival research.
Harvard and sports history. Readings: Smith, Chapters V-VII. Thomas Wentworth Higginson, Saints and Their BodiesAtlantic Monthly, March 1858, 582-595 (skim); Henry Lee Higginson, Remarks at the dedication of Soldiers Field (1890).

Week 4, February 12: Guest: Former Sports Illustrated sporswriter Richard "Dick" Friedman '73. Details to follow.
Readings: Smith, Chapters VII-XI.

(February 19 is Presidents Day. No class.)

Week 5, February 26: Smith, Chapters XII-XV and Epilogue.

Week 6, March 5: Discussion of project ideas. 
Reading: Smith, XIII-Epilogue; Young, Part I.
Friday, March 9: Project proposals due

(March 12 is during spring break. No class.)

Week 7, March 19: Special guest: John Powers of the Boston Globe. Interview, recent story
Readings: The NCAA and the Ivy League. Readings: 1954 Ivy Group AgreementIvy League Manual (out of date); Abridged NCAA Manuals

Week 8, March 26: Money and college sports today. Readings: The Economics of College Sports, Lawrence M. Kahn

Week 9, April 2: Guest: Jim Miller, former director of financial aid at Harvard and former dean of Admissions at Brown, and current member of Harvard admissions staff

Readings: Young, Part II.
Project outline/draft due

Week 10, April 9:  Project Reports I
Readings: George Santayana, Philosophy on the Bleachers,  Harvard Monthly, vol. 18, no. 5, 1894.

Week 11, April 16: Marathon day!

Week 12, April 23: Project Reports II

Tuesday, May 1, 5:00pm: Projects due