The Real All Americans: The Team that Changed a Game, a People, a Nation (Random House Large Print),   ISBN:9780739327197

Customer Rating: 

Jenkins' Real All Americans is reminiscent of a James Michener novel. No, it doesn't start with the dinosaurs, but it does go back to the essential beginning of the saga, and the story unfolds from there to set the stage. In it, we learn that while football was an invention of the Ivy league, it was the Indian students of Carlisle who gave us the game as we know and love it today. The story is compelling and a must-read for anybody who loves the sport.

Customer Rating: 

Sally Jenkins unfolds the story of the Carlisle Indian school football team and so much more. She masterfully weaves a story of triumph and tragedy, prejudice and pride, persistence and practice, strategies and skills. Within these well researched pages, one learns about the evolution of football as we know it today and a team of players led by their innovative coach Glenn "Pop" Warner. These Native Americans used their skills and strategies to full potential, despite a lack of size and backup players so critical to the brutality of football at this time. The Carlisle Indians played this game of "civilized warfare" on a gridiron under the most adverse conditions of weather, unscrupulous referees and coaches from opposing teams intent on inflicting two outcomes: severe punishment and ultimate defeat.

What makes this story so human is the dignity and sportsmanlike attributes instilled in the hearts and minds of the Carlisle Indian football players. These young men never lost sight of representing the best in their attitude and behavior, for the benefit of the sport and their beloved school. Thise who read this novel will come away with a new-found respect for the Carlisle Indian team, its dedicated teachers, coaches and the Headmaster who believed in the recognition and talents of Native Americans transitioning into a white man's world.

Customer Rating: 

"The Real All Americans," the story of the Carlisle Indians football team, is more history than sports. Sports fans might be disappointed since the first 125 pages are mainly history, focusing on the Indian chief "American Horse" and a young soldier Richard Pratt, who went on to found the Carlisle School for Indians.

Pratt's experiment with the Indians began at Fort Marion with Sarah Ann Mather helping to teach and educate the Indians. Pratt's goal was "total erasure of the old tribal life and the abolishment of the corrupt reservation system." Many of the chiefs were upset by the changes forced upon the Indians at Fort Marion.

Carlisle, "a social experiment unlike other schools," fielded its first football team in 1894. Its players were usually outsized, physically abused by opponents, and discriminated against by officials. They played, however, with lots of heart.

The book details the evolution of college football, particularly among the Ivy League teams, the center of power. The Carlisle Indians gained respect of their opponents, while helping to revolutionize the sport.

The arrival of Jim Thorpe and his rise to fame is chronicled. From 1911 through 1913, Carlisle posted a 38-3 record.

After Carlisle beat Army, 27-6, in 1912, the New York Times wrote that "Carlisle played the most perfect brand of football ever seen in America." Carlisle's football program, however, ended after the 1917 season.

In the epilogue, author Sally Jenkins gives a thumbnail sketch as to what happened to some of the major figures associated with the Carlisle School for Indians after its football program ended.

Jenkins does a wonderful job telling the story of this legendary school and its football program. The book is thoroughly researched, footnoted and easy to read. Highly recommended for anyone interested in sports history.

Customer Rating: 

Don't be fooled by the media blitz behind this book. It is filled with serious errors and is the product of poor, second hand, research. The "Long Knives" metaphor around which this book is built is just plain false. Jenkins picked that up from Babe Weyand's first book. He, in turn picked it up from none other than the less than believable 1940-50's sportscaster Bill Stern who included it in a 1948 ghost written book for juvenile readers without single authoritative source behind it. In a lengthy series of correspondence and ghost written articles Warner never mentions the Long Knives pep talk once. Nor do authoritative and contemporaneous (with Warner) football historians such as Allison Danzig and Tim Cohane. As to the double wing, Warner's correspondence, newspaper articles and interviews reveal that the Warner was using the single wing in 1906 and the double wing in 1910. Even Army in this game used the single wing as were many other teams in the Country. The Indians didn't consider Army very important. The "Big Four" (Harvard, Penn, Princeton and Yale) were far more important to Carlisle and Warner than Army. As to Ike. He was a bit player on a terrible "D" who was knocked out of the game when, comic book like, he and his teammate Charley Benedict collided headon in a missed attempt to "high low" Thorpe in the 3d quarter. If the "Long Knives" metaphor can be distilled into one game it is the 1905 game between Carlisle and the Cadets at West Point - seven years closer to Wounded Knee - and a game far more important on the national stage than the 1912 game. It took a special act of the War Department to be played at all. Jenkins doesn't even mention it. The Indians won that game too. Want more? See my "There Were No Oysters - The Truth About the 1912 Army vs. Carlisle Game" which I wrote earlier this year in response to Jenkins' and Lars Anderson's companion book about the 1912 game.

Customer Rating: 

"The Real Americans" is a well written and researched book. I have always wondered about the beginings of Carlisle. I was would have like to see more about the students who attended. It was very sparce on details about the ending of the Carlisle a school. The young girls who atttended the school, what were their accomplishments. Not enough pictures of the students and Jim Thorpe. I was looking for more of the latter. As an overall review of the book, I found it very interesting and worth the reading time.