When fans tune to the 100th Rose Bowl on New Year’s Day they’ll see teams with strikingly similar styles. Football purists will like what they see, too. Stanford and Michigan State feature nationally-ranked defenses with no-frills offenses. It’s “old style football” reminiscent of the way football was played before the advent of modern spread offenses. No gimmicks. The better team will win.
But the most interesting thing about this year’s Rose Bowl isn’t what will happen on the field, it’s about the history of these schools. It’s not a story of similarities, it’s one of contrasts; and it’s not a sports commentary, it’s a lesson about the history and evolution of American higher education. Stanford and MSU have evolved from profoundly different beginnings to hold the status they do today—worthy companions, on- and off the field.
Courtesy: Yahoo Sports
The Stanford Story
Stanford University was founded in the 1890s, the creation of Leland and Jane Stanford. Leland Stanford was a successful businessman (railroading) and a noteworthy political figure, too, having served as California’s governor and as a U.S. senator.
The Stanford’s had high aspirations for the school that carried their name (their son’s name to be specific): academically it would be “the Harvard of the West.” In addition to seeking academic prominence, Jane Stanford saw to it that women were admitted; that the curriculum would feature the arts; and that academic freedom would be an unyielding feature of campus life.
If the Stanford’s were alive today they would find their vision achieved and then some. Over the years over sixty Nobel laureates have had an association with Stanford. And companies started by university alumni—when aggregated financially—would add up to be the 10th largest economy in the world. There’s so much pressure on undergraduate admissions that Stanford admits fewer than 10% of all applicants. Without question, the name “Stanford” is synonymous with quality and impact.
Ranked year after year as a top ten institution—not only in the U.S., but in the world—it’s sometimes ranked # 1, as it was in the most recent evaluations published in Forbes. With such high standing, Stanford has a history of attracting world-class faculty members and graduating noteworthy alumni. Nationally familiar names—Condoleezza Rice, Carly Fiorina, Rachel Maddow, Scott Turow, Larry Page, David Packer, Dianne Feinstein, Sandra Day O’Connor, Ted Koppel, Chelsea Clinton, and Herbert Hoover, among many others—have spent time in Palo Alto. Especially significant is the range of people involved: Stanford has been an inviting place for people with diverse backgrounds—personally, politically, and socio-culturally.
Courtesy: CBS Local Detroit
The Michigan State Story
Michigan State has different roots, its founding serving a basic purpose: to provide access to people who lacked opportunity. Higher education in the early to mid-19th century in America was reserved for people with standing. This was a troubling circumstance to some, and voices of reform were heard across the country.
John C. Holmes, a Detroit businessman, was one of those voices. Holmes believed that Michigan needed a new approach to higher education—a practical focus with special attention given to educating the children of farmers and rural people, “common folk.” Not alone in his thinking, the Michigan Constitution of 1850 included language for establishing an agricultural college—either incorporating it into the University of Michigan or establishing it at a new institution. Holmes strongly preferred option two.
Holmes faced fierce opposition from Henry Philip Tappan, president of the University of Michigan, but with political savvy and networking skills Holmes’ idea won out. In 1855 the Michigan Legislature allocated a small sum (less than $200,000) to create the Agricultural College of the State of Michigan. Over the next fifteen years the curriculum was expanded and women were admitted to the college.
Making the transition from agricultural college to world-class university—the status Michigan State enjoys today—required skillful leadership, and Michigan State had that in the person of John Hannah. A former chair of the State Board of Agriculture (a position similar to what Holmes held a century earlier) Hannah became Michigan State’s president in 1941, a position he held for twenty-eight years. A gifted administrator with incredibly strong political skills Hannah had a knack for identifying a “sweet spot”: how a university could respond to society’s needs. He built Michigan State that way.
True to its populist mission, Hannah welcomed WWII and Korean War veterans to campus in the 40s and 50s, many of whom matriculated as Spartans through the benefits of the G.I. Bill. He also launched many new programs, initiatives that were designed to respond to contemporary circumstances in the U.S. and the world: hotel and restaurant management, travel and tourism, agricultural engineering, labor and industrial relations, and packaging, to name a few. His approach worked: Michigan State’s enrollment blossomed from 15,000 students in 1950 to nearly 40,000 in 1965.
Athletics figured prominently in Hannah’s strategy for transforming Michigan State from college to university. To be considered the best you need to be affiliated with the best, Hannah reasoned, so he worked tirelessly to get Michigan State admitted to The Western Conference (Big Ten). The opening came in 1946 when the University of Chicago dropped out. Despite opposition in some corners (with the intent of admitting the University of Pittsburgh instead), Hannah kept at it, especially in the face of opposition from the University of Michigan. Persistence won: Michigan State was admitted in 1950.
Football, in particular, was an important pathway in Hannah’s thinking and he needed a skillful coach to position Michigan State nationally. That man was Clarence “Biggie” Munn, a University of Minnesota alum. Although serving at the Spartan helm for a relatively short time (1947-53), Munn recorded a stellar record of 71-16-3. He topped off his career by winning the 1954 Rose Bowl—Michigan State’s first—beating Pac-8 rival UCLA, 28-20.
But Hannah knew that establishing football prominence couldn’t be done internally only. He needed outside help, and he got it from a friend, Father Theodore Hesburgh, Notre Dame’s president. Hesburgh agreed to have the Irish play Michigan State in football, a series that began in 1948. The strategy paid off for State in 1951 when the Spartans beat ND 35-0 in a nationally televised game. It was one of 28 straight wins under Munn (from 1950-53), which included two undefeated seasons and a like number of national championships.
Munn then turned over coaching reins to the affable Hugh “Duffy” Daugherty, a Syracuse alum who had assisted Munn during Munn’s coaching stints at SU and State. Daugherty maintained Michigan State’s prominence, most notably in the late 1950s and (later) in mid-1960s, when Michigan State won national championships with the likes of behemoth defensive lineman Bubba Smith. Most notable in that era was “The Game of the Century,” the 10-10 tie with Notre Dame in 1966.
Stanford and Michigan State: Portraits in Athletic Prominence
The clear intent at both schools is athletic excellence—and not in major sports only. Evidence of success comes by way of achieving top-twenty prominence across men’s and women’s programs. In the most recent Capital One Cup standings Michigan State ranks #10th and Stanford 13th in the composite of men’s sports nationally this year; and MSU ranks 12th and Stanford 16th in the composite of women’s sports nationally.
These are financially stable programs as well. Michigan State is listed by Forbes as one of the most valuable college football franchises nationally; and Stanford was noted by the magazine as #3 nationally when financial investment in the program is compared to overall success.
On the field, Stanford’s level of athletic excellence is almost incomprehensible. It has won at least one NCAA national championship each year since 1976-77; and the school has won over 100 national championships altogether. That’s a remarkable record for a top-tier academic school that competes at the highest level of collegiate sports.
Because of its academic standing and athletic prominence the school has a wide, but targeted, recruiting base: it seeks student-athletics who are academically exceptional and athletically gifted. Only a few other schools pursue this approach, most notably Duke in basketball and Notre Dame in football, but what sets Stanford apart is breadth of excellence.
The pathway to athletic prominence is different for Michigan State. Long known for its blue-collar ethic, the Spartans have had a tradition of attracting athletes of like kind over the years: tough, hard-nosed players.
A good example is Walt Kowalczyk, who played football for State in the late 1950s. An all-state running back out of Massachusetts, Kowalczyk’s dream was to play football at Notre Dame. Some years later he mused: “As a high school senior, I wanted to go to Notre Dame, but they told me I was too small, too slow, and I just didn’t fit into their football scheme. So I decided I wanted go to a school where I could have an opportunity to play against Notre Dame, and hopefully, knock their socks off!”
Kowalczyk came to Michigan State instead and became an All-American by the time he was through. Starting at right halfback he was known as “The Sprinting Blacksmith,” presumably for the hard-labor jobs he held over the summer—from carrying steel, to jobbing in a sawmill, to working on construction. At only 6 feet and 200 pounds, Kowalczyk had a straight-ahead, in-your-face running style. Once in the open he would seemingly sprint—nothing fancy—running as fast as he could, head slightly bowed, heading for the goal line. During Kowalczyk’s senior year (1957) the Spartans lost only one game (to Purdue) and beat rivals Michigan and Notre Dame by a combined score of 69-12.
Spartan fortunes have gone up and down over the years, but they always seem to be “up” when there are Walt Kowalczyk’s around—and there are many on this 2013 football squad. Players like The Sprinting Blacksmith don’t just play for the Spartans, they are Spartans.
Rose Bowl 2014
For Stanford, competing in the Rose Bowl confirms its elite standing, accentuating the respect it richly deserves—the ability to compete successfully against its Pacific 12 peers, most notably Oregon and USC. For Michigan State, it’s the end-goal of a long, grinding, and seemingly impossible quest: to win the storied Big Ten.
But this is more than a game for the fans of each school. The Rose Bowl is special, historically significant as the first bowl game. It pits the best of the West against the best of the Midwest, something that really meant something in collegiate days gone by.
For so many people, traveling to Pasadena is an athletic pilgrimage: young and old, alike, engage in a shared pursuit—to pay homage, celebrate, and cheer. There can’t be a loser this day. The timing is perfect, too: the game held (as it is) during the holiday season.
Perhaps that’s why Ralph Blane expressed it well in lyrics he wrote 70 years ago, words written for the sentimental holiday song, “Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas”:
Here we are as in olden days,
Happy golden days of yore.
Faithful friends who are dear to us,
Gathering once more.
This is what makes The Rose Bowl an important venue in the historical landscape of American sport.
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ENDNOTE: STIMULATING A NATIONAL MOVEMENT. Similar initiatives to Holmes’ work in Michigan were underway across the country in the 1850s and 60s—in Pennsylvania, Iowa, and Kansas, at the start—and these efforts mushroomed into a national campaign. Spearheaded by a U.S. Senator—Vermont’s Justin Morrill—and with strong support from President Abraham Lincoln, the Morrill Land-Grant Colleges Act became law in 1862. The Federal government gave tracts of land to the states, the sale of which would be used to lunch agricultural colleges across the nation.
Many of today’s most recognizable universities by name were launched from those humble, but politically important, beginnings—institutions that champion access and opportunity for everyday people. Some schools carry “state” names (e.g., North Carolina State); others are state flagship institutions (e.g., University of Arizona); and another group has seemingly private-sounding names (e.g., Clemson University). Across the U.S. today “land-grant universities” enroll a whopping 5.5 million undergraduates and over 1 million graduate students annually.
Many land-grant schools retained their college status well into the 20th Century. Michigan State, for example, won its first Rose Bowl (1954) before it became a university (1955). Today, though, many land grants have evolved into institutions of national, even international, standing—with strong research programs, a diverse set of doctoral programs, and professional programs across a variety of fields. Michigan State has become a land-grant and research-intense university of international standing, as has The Ohio State University, the University of Florida, the University of Connecticut, and many others schools across the countr
