Historic Highlights: Great Lakes football team won Rose Bowl a century ago

From 1946 until recent changes in the college football landscape, the Rose Bowl traditionally had been a matchup of the Big Ten and Pac-12 conference champions.

But in its early days, the participants were unusual, to say the least. The 1919 game was a reflection of the nation’s status in wartime.

That Rose Bowl featured the football team of the Great Lakes Naval Training Station north of Chicago, a collection that included some of the greatest names in gridiron history, including George Halas, Paddy Driscoll and Joe Conzelman, who were members of the Decatur Staleys inaugural NFL season in 1920.

The squad knocked off Mare Island of California 17-0 to cap off a 6-0-2 season. But their place in football lore is much more significant.

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With college teams decimated due to World War I and the NFL yet to be born – it was not established until 1920 – there was a big void in football in wartime. As a result, about 80 military teams at bases around the nation filled in, with rosters that included some hallowed names.

The most notable was Great Lakes, which had opened in 1904 and was greatly expanded during World War I to accommodate up to 50,000 recruits, becoming the largest facility of its kind on the globe.

“Due to the circumstances, the lack of top-tier athletes threatened the college football season,” said Joe Ziemba, a Chicago-based football researcher who has written several acclaimed books and articles. “The government used military teams as positive propaganda, and Great Lakes proved to be the best of the military all-star teams.”

The 1918 Great Lakes squad featured University of Illinois product Halas, the center, who founded the Decatur Staleys (later the Chicago Bears) two years later. The quarterback was Driscoll, a former Northwestern standout and NFL stalwart of the 1920s, while Conzelman, who played at Washington University in St. Louis, was a legend both on the field and on the sidelines.

A star running back with both the Staleys and the Rock Island Independents, Conzelman coached the Providence Steam Rollers to the 1928 NFL title, the last team that’s no longer in the league to win a championship. He also led the Chicago (now Arizona) Cardinals to the championship in 1947, the last time that franchise captured the league title.

One of the most remarkable characters in NFL history, Conzelman also was an accomplished writer, budding actor, songwriter and bandleader, and source of colorful quotes and witticisms like few before or since.

Like Halas and Driscoll, Conzelman is in the Pro Football Hall of Fame. They were among 15 Great Lakes players who went on to the NFL.

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Great Lakes kept stockpiling talent throughout the season, as top players from around the nation flocked to the upstart squad.

“It seemed that almost on a daily basis, another player or two would join the team from a major college,” Ziemba said. “Just to make this type of superlative team would have been an honor. Over 200 players tried out for the 1918 Great Lakes team, and uniforms were issued to less than 50.”

Great Lakes edged Iowa and Illinois to open the season before a pair of ties against Northwestern and Notre Dame. A 54-14 rout of Rutgers followed before a late touchdown gave the Bluejackets a 7-6 victory over Navy on Nov. 23. The regular season concluded with a 27-0 rout of Purdue, which earned Great Lakes berth in the Rose Bowl.

The Bluejackets’ opponent that Jan. 1 was Mare Island, which had won the previous year’s Rose Bowl, a game still in its infancy. After Michigan had blasted Stanford 49-0 in the inaugural game in 1902, football was not a part of the Tournament of Roses celebration again until 1916. Activities in the meantime included a polo match, a chariot race, an ostrich race and a race between a camel and an elephant.

But Great Lakes was ready, and Driscoll kicked a 35-yard field goal before connecting on a 30-yard scoring pass to Halas. Halas then iced the game with a 77-yard interception return to the 3-yard line in a 17-0 win. The return remains the longest nonscoring play in the history of the Rose Bowl.

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A century later, Great Lakes holds a unique place in football history, mainly because of the circumstances that surrounded the squad.

“Besides the threat of World War I, the country was also challenged by the epic influenza outbreak,” Ziemba said. “The emergence of the Great Lakes football team provided a welcome outlet for fans, who were ready for more positive releases, such as football.

“Great Lakes became the darling of the Midwest press, especially in Chicago, and the victory in the Rose Bowl was embraced by fans and media alike,” Ziemba said. “It was a one-of-a-kind national champion, the likes of which will never be duplicated. It was a team that should never be forgotten.”

• Tom Emery is a freelance writer and historical researcher from Carlinville, Illinois. He may be reached at 217-710-8392 or ilcivilwar@yahoo.com.