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| | Reader's Companion to American History - -FOOTBALL (Site not responding. Last check: 2007-09-19) |
 | | American football descends from a rowdy medieval game in which, typically, the men, women, and children of one village attempted to kick, throw, or carry a ball across fields and streams to the fiercely defended portals of another village's parish church. |
 | | Americans had occasionally played some forms of the premodern game, but the first intercollegiate contests occurred November 6, 1869, when Rutgers defeated Princeton in soccer by a score of 6-4, and May 15, 1874, when Harvard and McGill played to a scoreless tie in rugby. |
 | | Professional football, born in the 1890s, came to maturity under the leadership of George Halas, principal founder of the National Football League (nfl; 1920). |
| college.hmco.com /history/readerscomp/rcah/html/ah_032000_football.htm (1022 words) |
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