Raymond W. "Ducky" Pond (February 17, 1902 – August 25, 1982) was an

American football American football (referred to simply as football in the United States and Canada), also known as gridiron, is a team sport played by two teams of eleven players on a rectangular field with goalposts at each end. The offense, the team with ...

and

baseball Baseball is a bat-and-ball sport played between two teams of nine players each, taking turns batting and fielding. The game occurs over the course of several plays, with each play generally beginning when a player on the fielding tea ...

player and football coach. He was the head football coach at

Yale University Yale University is a private research university in New Haven, Connecticut. Established in 1701 as the Collegiate School, it is the third-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and among the most prestigious in the wo ...

from 1934 to 1940, and at

Bates College Bates College () is a private liberal arts college in Lewiston, Maine. Anchored by the Historic Quad, the campus of Bates totals with a small urban campus which includes 33 Victorian Houses as some of the dormitories. It maintains of nature p ...

in 1941 and from 1946 to 1951, compiling career

college football College football (french: Football universitaire) refers to gridiron football played by teams of student athletes. It was through college football play that American football rules first gained popularity in the United States. Unlike most ...

record of 52–55–3. Pond's record at Yale was 30–25–2 record, including a 4–3 mark versus

Harvard Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636 as Harvard College and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of higher le ...

. He mentored two of the first three winners of the

Heisman Trophy The Heisman Memorial Trophy (usually known colloquially as the Heisman Trophy or The Heisman) is awarded annually to the most outstanding player in college football. Winners epitomize great ability combined with diligence, perseverance, and hard ...

Larry Kelley Lawrence Morgan Kelley (May 30, 1915 – June 27, 2000) was an American football player. He played at the end position for the Yale Bulldogs football program from 1934 to 1936. He was the captain of the 1936 Yale Bulldogs football team that ...

and

Clint Frank Clinton E. Frank (September 13, 1915 – July 7, 1992) was an American football player and advertising executive. He played halfback for Yale University, where he won both the Heisman Trophy and Maxwell Award in 1937. In 1954, he founded t ...

. At Bates, Pond led the undefeated and untied 1946 Bobcats squad to the inaugural

Glass Bowl The Glass Bowl is a stadium in Toledo, Ohio. It is primarily used for American football, and is the home field of the American football team of the University of Toledo Rockets. It is located on the school's Bancroft campus, just south of the ba ...

.Bergin, Thomas. ''The Game: The Harvard – Yale Football Rivalry, 1875–1983'', Yale University Press, New Haven/London, 1984. Pond was a

public relations Public relations (PR) is the practice of managing and disseminating information from an individual or an organization (such as a business, government agency, or a nonprofit organization) to the public in order to influence their perception. P ...

executive after his career in athletics.

Early life and playing career

Pond, after attending high school in

Torrington, Connecticut Torrington is the most populated municipality and only city in Litchfield County, Connecticut, Litchfield County, Connecticut and the Northwest Hills (Connecticut), Northwest Hills region. It is also the core city of Greater Torrington, one of the ...

, his birthplace, and the

Hotchkiss School The Hotchkiss School is a coeducational University-preparatory school#North America, preparatory school in Lakeville, Connecticut, United States. Hotchkiss is a member of the Eight Schools Association and Ten Schools Admissions Organization. It i ...

, was a member of the Yale Class of 1925, and a 1924 first-team All-American at halfback. Pond starred in the 1923 edition of The Game. He was nicknamed "Ducky" by

Grantland Rice Henry Grantland "Granny" Rice (November 1, 1880July 13, 1954) was an early 20th-century American sportswriter known for his elegant prose. His writing was published in newspapers around the country and broadcast on the radio. Early years Rice wa ...

for returning a fumble 63 yards that afternoon against Harvard on a field that resembled "seventeen lakes, five quagmires and a water hazard". Yale had not scored a touchdown versus Harvard since the end of World War I.

Coaching career

An uproar engulfed Pond's hiring as head football coach at Yale in 1934. Though he had been head scout and an assistant for his predecessor,

Mal Stevens Marvin Allen "Mal" Stevens (April 14, 1900 – December 6, 1979) was an American football player, coach, naval officer, and orthopedic surgeon. He served as the head football coach at Yale University from 1928 to 1932 and at New York University f ...

, who coached from 1928 to 1932, and an alumnus like every head coach before him, ''

Time Time is the continued sequence of existence and events that occurs in an apparently irreversible succession from the past, through the present, into the future. It is a component quantity of various measurements used to sequence events, to ...

'' magazine reported that the "New York City alumni, who had waged a furious fight to end Yale's policy of graduate coaches and demanded a proven winner from outside" were enraged that

Michigan Michigan () is a state in the Great Lakes region of the upper Midwestern United States. With a population of nearly 10.12 million and an area of nearly , Michigan is the 10th-largest state by population, the 11th-largest by area, and the ...

Harry Kipke Harry George Kipke (; March 26, 1899 – September 14, 1972) was an American football, basketball, and baseball player and coach. He was the head football coach at Michigan State College in 1928 and at the University of Michigan from 1929 to 1937 ...

had not been invited to coach the team. Kipke had coached Michigan to consecutive

national championships A national championship(s) is the top achievement for any sport or contest within a league of a particular nation or nation state. The title is usually awarded by contests, ranking systems, stature, ability, etc. This determines the best team, indi ...

in 1932 and 1933. The alumni probably desired a reversal of the program's decline versus Harvard. Yale led The Game series 22–6–5 from 1875 to 1912; however, from 1913-33, Harvard led the series 11–7–1. Pond, whose head coaching experience had been two seasons at Hotchkiss, was the last alumnus head coach of football at Yale. Reginald Root, head coach for the 1933 season and an alumnus, had a .500 record and lost to Harvard. Pond coached an historically significant game in 1934 versus

Princeton Princeton University is a private research university in Princeton, New Jersey. Founded in 1746 in Elizabeth as the College of New Jersey, Princeton is the fourth-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and one of the ni ...

. The 1934 contest was the last time a group of 11 starters played the entire 60 minutes of a game. At

Palmer Stadium Palmer Stadium was a stadium in Princeton, New Jersey, United States. It hosted the Princeton University Tigers football team, as well as the track and field team. The stadium held 45,750 people at its peak and was opened in 1914 with a game ag ...

, Yale ended Princeton's 15-game winning streak with a 7–0 upset on November 17. ''

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...

'' (November 17, 1934) reported that an expected capacity crowd of 52,000 would attend the contest, the 58th in the series. Princeton won another 12 consecutive games after the loss. The Yale starters,

among them, were nicknamed Iron Men by the press. Kelley scored the contest's sole touchdown.

Fritz Crisler Herbert Orin "Fritz" Crisler (; January 12, 1899 – August 19, 1982) was an American college football coach who is best known as "the father of two-platoon football," an innovation in which separate units of players were used for offense and d ...

, considered the father of two-platoon football, was Pond's counterpart at Princeton. The contest has been subject of two books, ''Yale's Ironmen: A Story of Football & Lives in The Decade of the Depression & Beyond'' and ''Football's Last Iron Men: 1934, Yale vs. Princeton, And One Stunning Upset''. Pond coached two

winners while at Yale. End Larry Kelley in 1936 and halfback Clint Frank in 1937 were the second and third winners of the most prestigious individual award in football. Among the total of 21 assistants employed by Pond at Yale, future President

Gerald Ford Gerald Rudolph Ford Jr. ( ; born Leslie Lynch King Jr.; July 14, 1913December 26, 2006) was an American politician who served as the 38th president of the United States from 1974 to 1977. He was the only president never to have been elected ...

served for four seasons, 1937–1940, while attending

Yale Law School Yale Law School (Yale Law or YLS) is the law school of Yale University, a Private university, private research university in New Haven, Connecticut. It was established in 1824 and has been ranked as the best law school in the United States by ''U ...

, and

Greasy Neale Alfred Earle "Greasy" Neale (November 5, 1891 – November 2, 1973) was an American football and baseball player and coach. Early life and playing career Neale was born in Parkersburg, West Virginia. Although writers eventually assumed that Nea ...

was hired as the backfield coach right after Pond's announced elevation on February 1, 1934. Neale had coached

West Virginia West Virginia is a state in the Appalachian, Mid-Atlantic and Southeastern regions of the United States.The Census Bureau and the Association of American Geographers classify West Virginia as part of the Southern United States while the Bur ...

to a 3–5–3 record in 1933, his third year there. Neale was clearly the chief strategist among the coaches.

Honors

Yale's athletic department awards annually the Raymond W. Pond Pitching Award.Office of the Secretary, Yale University.

Head coaching record

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Pond, Ducky 1902 births 1982 deaths American football halfbacks Baseball pitchers Bates Bobcats football coaches Georgia Pre-Flight Skycrackers football coaches Yale Bulldogs baseball players Yale Bulldogs football coaches Yale Bulldogs football players United States Navy personnel of World War II American public relations people United States Navy officers Hotchkiss School alumni People from Torrington, Connecticut Players of American football from Connecticut