Jesse Bright Riggs (February 3, 1870 – March 9, 1945) was an All-American

football Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kicking a ball to score a goal. Unqualified, the word ''football'' normally means the form of football that is the most popular where the word is used. Sports commonly c ...

player. Riggs played for the

Princeton University Princeton University is a private university, private research university in Princeton, New Jersey. Founded in 1746 in Elizabeth, New Jersey, Elizabeth as the College of New Jersey, Princeton is the List of Colonial Colleges, fourth-oldest ins ...

football team from 1888 to 1891. He was an All-American in 1890 and captain of the 1891 Princeton football team.

Biography

A native of

Baltimore, Maryland Baltimore ( , locally: or ) is the List of municipalities in Maryland, most populous city in the U.S. state of Maryland, fourth most populous city in the Mid-Atlantic (United States), Mid-Atlantic, and List of United States cities by popula ...

, Riggs was the son of Lawrason Riggs, a well-known banker of

. The family had founded and operated

Riggs Bank Riggs Bank was a bank headquartered in Washington, D.C. For most of its history, it was the largest bank headquartered in that city. On May 13, 2005, after the exposure of several money laundering scandals, the bank was acquired by PNC Financ ...

, which financed

Samuel Morse Samuel Finley Breese Morse (April 27, 1791 – April 2, 1872) was an American inventor and painter. After having established his reputation as a portrait painter, in his middle age Morse contributed to the invention of a single-wire telegraph ...

's invention of the telegraph in 1845 and lent $16 million to the United States to fund the

Mexican–American War The Mexican–American War, also known in the United States as the Mexican War and in Mexico as the (''United States intervention in Mexico''), was an armed conflict between the United States and Mexico from 1846 to 1848. It followed the 1 ...

. Riggs enrolled at Princeton University where he played at the halfback and right guard positions from 1888 to 1891. He was selected to the 1890 College Football All-America Team. In December 1890, the members of the Princeton team elected Riggs as the captain of the 1891 football team. However, Riggs resigned the position before the 1891 season started. Riggs had become embroiled in a controversy over the increasing level of violence in football. The 1890 Princeton–Yale game was marked by instances of players throwing punches and fighting. Yale's captain Church showed deep scratches on his face and accused Riggs of striking his fingernails into Church's face and saying, "Now I have you. I'll just do you." Another Yale player said, "The most striking part to my mind was the disgraceful language used by Riggs, and also the dirty work he indulged in." Nonetheless, Riggs' ruthless behavior led Princeton to an impressive record that season. Riggs was married in October 1893 to Charlotte M. Symington (c.1870–1938). Riggs' younger brother,

Dudley Riggs Dudley Riggs (January 18, 1932 – September 22, 2020) was an improvisational comedian who created the Instant Theater Company in New York, which later moved to Minneapolis to become the Brave New Workshop comedy troupe. Family and early care ...

followed him to Princeton, where he, too, became an All-American football player. In September 1893, a newspaper account compared Dudley to Jesse: "Another new man that gives much promise is a brother of the great Jesse Riggs, '92. This one's name is Dudley and he weighs 185 pounds—not bad to begin with. It is said he is another Jesse, built like him, a football fighter of his spirit and just as tricky as the big guard ..." In 1965, Riggs was nominated for the

College Football Hall of Fame The College Football Hall of Fame is a hall of fame and interactive attraction devoted to college football. The National Football Foundation (NFF) founded the Hall in 1951 to immortalize the players and coaches of college football that were vote ...

, but did not receive a sufficient percentage of the vote for induction.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Riggs, Jesse 19th-century players of American football All-American college football players American football guards Princeton Tigers football players 1870 births 1945 deaths