On Saturday, Maine hosts Yale in the Black Bears' homecoming game, where they'll celebrate the school's 150th anniversary by donning shirts inspired by the 1920s.
Maine and Yale used to play every so often in the 1920s and '30s, when college football was a very different world and Yale was a national powerhouse that played in front of crowds of up to 80,000 at the Yale Bowl. Basically, it was Maine's equivalent of today's FBS games. In 1929, Maine visited Yale and was smothered 38-0 even though the game was played with 10-minute quarters, according to the Yale Daily News account of the game. And hey, here are some highlights ...
It must have been hard to tell the teams apart, since both wore white helmets, navy jerseys and tan pants.
I have decided to give Maine light blue friction strips for the uni graphic, since contemporary accounts always make reference to the "light blue" or "pale blue," and the friction strips are noticeably lighter than the ones from 1928-29.
As you can see from the team picture above, Maine was not afraid to recycle its uniforms to the max. (Jayvee and freshman team pictures from the early '40s show players wearing rags from the '20s.) I didn't see any style other than the first one in the above clip, but I figured I'd play it safe. For all I know, those shirts were worn only for the team pic before some new shirts arrived. Notice everyone in the front (likely the starters) is wearing the new garb.
No. 48 for Yale was the legendary (at least for that era) Albie Booth, all 5-6, 144 pounds of him. "Little Boy Blue" was a tailback who ran, threw and kicked -- the classic single-wing triple threat. Following a career that landed him in the College Football Hall of Fame, Booth was an assistant for Yale and managed the ice cream division of a dairy, which is making my very hungry.
Also Saturday, Maine will honor its 1965 Tangerine Bowl team. Read more about that team (and its uniforms, of course) here.
Can't bear to be without Black Bear uniforms? Here are some more: 2014, 2011-13, 1997-99, 1976-84, 1975, 1974, 1965, more 1965, 1957-59, 1949-50, 1928-29. Rivalry week: Maine-New Hampshire.I have decided to give Maine light blue friction strips for the uni graphic, since contemporary accounts always make reference to the "light blue" or "pale blue," and the friction strips are noticeably lighter than the ones from 1928-29.
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| No, it's not an all-star team from a pickup league; it's the 1930 Maine Black Bears. Most of the players are wearing new jerseys, but others appears to wearing whatever was lying around at the moment. |
As you can see from the team picture above, Maine was not afraid to recycle its uniforms to the max. (Jayvee and freshman team pictures from the early '40s show players wearing rags from the '20s.) I didn't see any style other than the first one in the above clip, but I figured I'd play it safe. For all I know, those shirts were worn only for the team pic before some new shirts arrived. Notice everyone in the front (likely the starters) is wearing the new garb.
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| A close-up of the 1930 Maine jersey, plus an account of the Yale game from that year from the Prism yearbook. Note the description of Maine as the "Pale Blue." |
No. 48 for Yale was the legendary (at least for that era) Albie Booth, all 5-6, 144 pounds of him. "Little Boy Blue" was a tailback who ran, threw and kicked -- the classic single-wing triple threat. Following a career that landed him in the College Football Hall of Fame, Booth was an assistant for Yale and managed the ice cream division of a dairy, which is making my very hungry.
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| Despite what this otherwise awesome card says, Albie Booth was a single-wing tailback. |
Also Saturday, Maine will honor its 1965 Tangerine Bowl team. Read more about that team (and its uniforms, of course) here.
Want more from the sons of old Eli? Look here: 2014, 2013, 1997-98, 1994, 1996, 1979-82, 1978, 1974-77, 1967-68, 1965, 1959-60. Rivalry Week: Harvard-Yale.
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