A History of the Football: Ch. 1 Pt. 4
A History of the Football: Ch. 1 Pt. 4
The 1912 Specifications
It is commonly believed that the football was made slimmer in 1912. It is a story often told, including by me in the past, but there is no contemporary evidence that a change occurred that year. From 1886 through 1902, the rule book specified a Lillywhite or Spalding model as the official ball, so those models defined the regulation size and shape. Then, from 1903 through 1911, the rule book did not identify an official ball. It also did not provide detailed size and shape specifications, so teams could have used a ball of any size or shape. John Heisman reflected on the omission corrected by the 1912 rule change, writing:
…so far as the rule was concerned, a team could have brought out a football as big as a barrel had they chosen to do so, and one that weighed a ton, or an ounce, and the other team would have been unable to pull a rule book to back up [their protest], so long as the blooming thing had the right shape.
The 1912 rule did not change the ball's size; it merely specified a ball consistent with the Spalding J5 already on the market and previously considered the official ball. The new rule read:
The ball shall be made of leather, enclosing a rubber bladder. It shall be tightly inflated and shall have the shape of a prolate spheroid. Circumference, long axis, from 28 inches to 28 1/2 inches; short axis, from 22 1/2 inches to 23 inches; Weight, from 14 ounces to 15 ounces.
Spalding advertisements for the J5 in the 1911 and 1912 Official Foot Ball Guides continued claiming the ball was the "only official college foot ball," with the ball's markings and shape unchanged from those of 1903. Nevertheless, since the 1912 rules for the ball were brand and model-independent, any manufacturer could produce a ball meeting those specifications. As we will see, allowing multiple manufacturers to produce regulation balls opened the door for some manufacturers to skirt the specifications as football's passing game developed.