This letter is in reply to a letter written by Josh Edwards, Tufts Student Tour Coordinator, in which he argues that Tufts played the first intercollegiate football game against Harvard in 1875. He sites as his sole reference, to the Tufts claim, the website of the Tufts Athletic Department. An unbiased reference, no doubt. Perhaps he should go to the Harvard University Football website and check out their official history. Oops, Tufts is not mentioned. McGill University is cited by Harvard as being its first intercollegiate opponent in 1874. Harvard played somebody from Montreal before Medford.
Other than the official Tufts website, no one else gives Tufts credit for playing the first intercollegiate football game no matter what the "rules" were or how they evolved. Tufts can only justifiably claim that it won "its" first football game.
Mr. Edwards further states that I have insulted the Tufts Tour Guides somehow. No such insinuation or insult was ever made. My letter was rather tongue in cheek with teases given to Columbia football's losing tradition and another to Harvard's propensity to always claim firsts. Please reread my letter.
I do take seriously though a university's statements and claims about itself. And if there is an error here, and I believe there is, then the University needs to investigate it. Even with an item as seemingly mundane as this issue, one's greater credibility can be put to question. For if not just this, what else?
Perhaps there is more to your history with P.T. Barnum as an original Tufts' benefactor. Tufts' football tidbit, and the cannon that goes with it, is one big "Jumbo" fabrication.
Dr. Peter J. Zegarelli
Sleepy Hollow, NY
