Sport: Six-Man

In 1869 when Princeton and Rutgers played a football game, there were 50 players on the field, 25 on each side. By 1877 the size of a football team had generally been whittled down to 15 men. Five years later Walter Camp succeeded in his campaign to reduce teams to eleven men. That the possibilities for experiment are still far from exhausted was last week being demonstrated by some 700 U. S. schools, most of them small and obscure, which began the biggest season to date for the closely related but autonomous pastime of six-man football.

“Six-man,” invented three years ago by a 25-year-old Nebraska high-school coach named Stephen Epler, was first played at Hebron in the fall of 1934 by two teams recruited from four Nebraska high schools. Having played regulation football at Nebraska, Cotner College (now defunct), Mr. Epler bemoaned the fact that his little school (30 boys) did not have enough potential footballers to form a team. He devised a set of rules, got the friendly aid of Athletic Director William Roselius of nearby Hebron College, and, after a season of experimental games, had his rule book published. Last spring six-man caught the eye of Editor Franklin M. Reck of The American Boy. Last month Editor Reck not only recommended the game to youths but began distributing the Epler rule book.

Official six-man, according to Inventor Epler, is “regulation football played with six players on a side.” A team is composed of a center, two ends, a quarterback, halfback and fullback. The player receiving the ball from center may not cross the scrimmage line with it, but must pass it to someone else. After that, six-man is hard to distinguish from eleven-man. Chief variations: a playing field is 80 by 40 yd. (instead of 100 yd. by 160 ft.), quarters are ten minutes instead of 15, the kickoff is made from the 30-yd. line, a field goal counts four points.

A predominantly passing game, six-man is not only faster but apparently safer than standard football. Although admission prices range from a dime to 40¢ and gate receipts rarely exceed $50 a game, they usually defray all expenses. Nebraska practice is to pay the referee $3, guarantee the visiting team $5. One North Dakota league pays its officials nothing whatever. This year, with six-man being played in 17 States, Editor Reck and Inventor Epler, now a Columbia graduate student, plan to select an All-American team.