The 1896 Lafayette football team represented

Lafayette College Lafayette College is a private liberal arts college in Easton, Pennsylvania. Founded in 1826 by James Madison Porter and other citizens in Easton, the college first held classes in 1832. The founders voted to name the college after General Laf ...

in the sport of

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 wi ...

during the

1896 college football season The 1896 college football season had no clear-cut champion, with the ''Official NCAA Division I Football Records Book'' listing Lafayette and Princeton as having been selected national champions. Lafayette finished with an 11–0–1 record whil ...

. The team was retroactively selected as the co-national champion by two selectors, the National Championship Foundation and

Parke H. Davis Parke Hill Davis (July 15, 1871 – June 5, 1934)"PARKE H. DAVIS BURIED.; Many Prominent Men at Funeral of Football Authority", special to ''The New York Times'', June 9, 1934 was an American football player, coach, and historian. Shortly befo ...

. Lafayette's national championship this season was one of the most surprising and dramatic in the early history of college football. Lafayette began its season by tying

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 nin ...

0–0, the first tie in their series, and defeated

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 ...

three times in three days by a combined score of 56–0. At 4–0–1, Lafayette was set to meet the

Penn Quakers The Penn Quakers are the athletic teams of the University of Pennsylvania. The school sponsors 33 varsity sports. The school has won three NCAA national championships in men's fencing and one in women's fencing. School colors There are ...

on October 24 at

Franklin Field Franklin Field is a sports stadium in Philadelphia, United States, at the eastern edge of the University of Pennsylvania's campus. It is the home stadium for the Penn Relays, and the University of Pennsylvania's stadium for American football, foo ...

. Penn, coached by

George Washington Woodruff George Washington Woodruff (February 22, 1864 – March 24, 1934) was an American football player, rower, coach, teacher, lawyer and politician. He served as the head football coach at the University of Pennsylvania (1892–1901), the University ...

, was in the midst of a 34-game winning streak and was only guaranteeing Lafayette $150 for a game that would net $10,000. As an intense media war surrounded the game, Lafayette enrolled Fielding H. Yost, a tackle from West Virginia, who Lafayette had defeated in the final game of their series on October 17. With Yost,

Charles Rinehart Charles Ramsay Rinehart (December 31, 1875 – October 30, 1933) was an American football player, engineer and businessman. He was elected to the College Football Hall of Fame in 1964. He played high school football at Phillipsburg High School ...

, and the inventor of the football helmet George Barclay on the field, Lafayette won 6–4. It was the first victory of a "small school" over one of the Big Four (

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 ...

–

Yale 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 wor ...

– Penn–

). Penn won its next 31 games. Lafayette closed its season with an 18–6 win over

Navy A navy, naval force, or maritime force is the branch of a nation's armed forces principally designated for naval and amphibious warfare; namely, lake-borne, riverine, littoral, or ocean-borne combat operations and related functions. It in ...

. Following the season, Lafayette was recognized as

national champions National champions are corporations which are technically private businesses but due to governmental policy are ceded a dominant position in a national economy. In this system, these large organizations are expected not only to seek profit but als ...

along with Princeton (10–0–1) and was the first national champion outside the Harvard–Yale–Princeton–Penn rotation prevalent during that era. However, absent from their 1896 schedule was the annual rivalry with Lehigh, which cancelled two games scheduled for November in protest over the eligibility and amateur status of Barclay, who had played professional baseball the previous summer.

Schedule

References

Lafayette Lafayette Leopards football seasons College football national champions College football undefeated seasons Lafayette football {{collegefootball-1890s-season-stub