College Football Thanksgiving Traditions: A Century of Rivalry and Revelry
Editor’s note: Throughout the month of November, we remember some of the best NFL, college football, and sports culture occasions around the Thanksgiving holiday in Thanksgiving Sports Moments.
The tradition of playing football on Thanksgiving Day dates back to the late 19th century, interwoven with the very fabric of the holiday itself. From its humble beginnings on college campuses to its current status as a professional sports spectacle, Thanksgiving football has become a deeply ingrained part of American culture.
The Genesis of a Tradition: College Football's Early Thanksgiving Clashes
College football was born on Nov. 6, 1869, when 25 men from Princeton met 25 men from Rutgers in a rough game that looked more like soccer than the American football we know today. But college football as a spectacle was born seven years later when Princeton and Yale, playing a modified game of rugby, met on Thanksgiving Day 1876 in Hoboken and launched an American holiday tradition.
In those early days, college football was the only game in town. The first "official" college football game was played by Rutgers University and Princeton University on November 6, 1869. As the sport gained popularity, so did the tradition of playing games on Thanksgiving. The Intercollegiate Football Association (IFA) formalized this custom in 1882 by scheduling an annual championship game in New York City on Thanksgiving Day between its two leading teams.
"A game of foot-ball will be played between the Yale and Princeton Clubs at the St. George’s Grounds, Hoboken, to-day,” wrote The New York Times on Page 8 in the New Jersey section of “City and Suburban News.”
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“A fine game is anticipated. The play will begin at 2 o’clock.”
About 1,000 people watched Princeton win two goals to zero - six years before a points system was instituted for scoring.
By 1880, Princeton and Yale moved their budding rivalry to New York City for the first time. New York’s daily newspapers were in an increasingly competitive battle for readership in the rapidly growing city. They soon recognized an insatiable interest in football, which could sustain expanded sports sections in the fall after baseball season ended. Some began going all in on college football coverage, particularly the Thanksgiving game, which proved over the 1880s to have mass appeal stretching beyond the students and alumni of the schools. Everyone picked a side, proudly displaying the colors of their favored team even if they had no personal connection.
In 1883, 6,000 fans turned out to watch Yale top Harvard for the championship. In 1884, “many wounds, much bad temper and intense excitement” were the themes as Yale and Princeton played a scoreless draw in front of 15,000. In 1887, The Evening World devoted nearly half of the front page of a Thanksgiving extra edition to Yale’s 17-8 win against Harvard, coverage that included everything from a play-by-play recounting of the game to a lengthy list of names of prominent spectators.
By 1889, 30,000 people packed into the Berkeley Oval for Princeton’s 10-0 win against Yale.
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“If there has existed a doubt of the popularity of football as a college sport or of the general interest it arouses in the public mind,” wrote The New York Times, which had moved coverage to its front page, “that doubt must disappear in the face of yesterday’s proceedings.”
These early Thanksgiving games were more than just sporting events; they were social gatherings that drew crowds from all walks of life. Long before the Detroit Lions and Dallas Cowboys became synonymous with Thanksgiving, college football’s pre-eminent teams at Princeton and Yale (and sometimes Harvard) emerged as the toast of New York, staging end-of-season championship games that captured the imagination of newspaper readers around the country and upended holiday traditions, accelerating the growth of football in America in the process.
Controversy and Commercialization: The Dark Side of Thanksgiving Football
However, the rise of Thanksgiving football was not without its detractors. Even in the late 19th century, concerns were raised about the commercialization of college sports and the excessive attention being paid to what some considered a mere game.
These were the questions asked after the biggest game of the season. It was Thanksgiving Day 1891. College football was 22 years old.
Yale beat Princeton 19-0 in the championship game in front of 40,000 people at the Polo Grounds in New York City. Fifteen years after the football powers’ first Thanksgiving clash across the Hudson River in Hoboken, N.J., some observers couldn’t help but wonder to The Evening World whether the Thanksgiving game had become both an overly commercialized stain on a wholesome holiday and a troubling step too far for college sports.
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“They said that the time was when college athletes were content with victory and thought less of dollars; when they were willing to contest for supremacy for glory alone, and did not stipulate that the meeting should be in a city of 3,000,000 inhabitants, where 50,000 or more persons could witness the game by paying for it. They deprecated very much the commercial character which college athletics have assumed of recent years.”
Nowhere were the perceived excesses of football on display more than in the Thanksgiving games in New York, from the brutality of the sport between bitter rivals on the field to the revelry before and after the games from players and students who took advantage of their freedom away from campus to the substantial financial impact as ticket sales soared. In 1891, an estimated $50,000 in revenue was split among the Manhattan Athletic Club, which staged the game, and the Princeton and Yale football associations.
Thanksgiving football in New York reached its peak Nov. 30, 1893, when Princeton ended Yale’s 37-game winning streak at Manhattan Field.
“It was ideal and historic football which was played at Manhattan Field yesterday afternoon,” wrote The New York Times. “Ideal as far as the game, the weather and the spectacular effects of the contest; historic, inasmuch as the victors broke the traditions of Yale’s invincibility and avenged Princeton’s series of past defeats in a manner that was as thorough as it was unexpected.”
By this point, newspapers like the New York World devoted pages of coverage to the event in all facets, from the results on the field to the luminaries in attendance to the celebrations in the streets and theaters at night. On its front page, it published a list of people who were arrested in the aftermath of Princeton’s 6-0 win alongside detailed accounts of what happened on the field, via both writers and artists. It even published full play-by-play charts of the action. The New York Times also gave front-page space to the arrested, listing the employers of those who spent the night in jail. The Times went on to detail various scenes of drunken incidents from Princeton and Yale students and fans and how the police responded.
“Some of the Princeton boys found yellow lamp shades and used them in a most ridiculous fashion,” wrote the Times. “They wore them in their hats, and several of them wore them into the West Thirtieth Street Station.”
As the schools tried to get a handle on the excesses of college football, the Thanksgiving game was an easy target to take back some measure of control. First, Princeton and Yale moved their New York clash to the Saturday after Thanksgiving in 1894. By 1897, the party was over: The rivalry moved back to the Connecticut and New Jersey campuses.
Spreading the Gospel: Thanksgiving Football Beyond the Northeast
Despite the controversies, Thanksgiving football had already taken root and begun to spread across the country. Players from Yale and Princeton fanned out across the country to spread the gospel of the sport to football-hungry programs south and west seeking to learn the game from those who knew it best. Thanksgiving traditions followed. Amos Alonzo Stagg learned football from Walter Camp at Yale and was hired to coach football and generate publicity for the new University of Chicago. The Maroons hosted Michigan on Thanksgiving in 1893.
By the time Yale and Princeton played their final Thanksgiving game that year, it was too late for the critics to get their wish. College football was taking over the country, and football on Thanksgiving was here to stay, from Chicago’s famous 2-0 win against Michigan in 1905 to the Nebraska-Oklahoma “Game of the Century” in 1971 to the modern Egg Bowl and the professional tradition of games in Detroit and Dallas that rule the holiday today.
The Rise of the NFL: A New Era of Thanksgiving Football
While college football laid the foundation for Thanksgiving football, the National Football League (NFL) took the tradition to new heights. The NFL's Thanksgiving Day games have traditionally included one game hosted by the Detroit Lions since 1934, and one game hosted by the Dallas Cowboys since 1966 (with two exceptions in 1975 and 1977). Since 2006, a third game has also been played in prime time on Thanksgiving night.
In 1934, the Detroit Lions began their Thanksgiving tradition with a game hosting the Chicago Bears. The Lions have played a Thanksgiving game every year since, except for the years 1939-1944, as the games were paused during World War II.
The first owner of the Lions, George A. Richards, recognized that his Lions were taking a back seat to the baseball Tigers on the sports pages. The matchup between the Lions and the World Champion Chicago Bears proved to be an all-time classic. The 1934 Lions had not allowed a touchdown until their eighth game and entered the game with the Bears with a 10-1 record. But with 11 straight wins, Chicago had an even better record. The 26,000 tickets for the Turkey Day clash in the University of Detroit Stadium, were sold out two weeks in advance of the game.
The Detroit Lions Thanksgiving Day heritage gained national attention in another way, starting with the very first game in 1934. Knowing the publicity potential of radio, Richards along with NBC Radio, set up a 94-station network to broadcast the Lions-Bears showdown.
In 1966, the Dallas Cowboys, who had been founded six years earlier, adopted the practice of hosting Thanksgiving games. As a new team, they were looking to create a fanbase, and the addition of another Thanksgiving game was a very effective way to accomplish this.
Other teams eventually became frustrated with the Lions and Cowboys holding all of the Thanksgiving fame, so the NFL introduced a third game to the holiday lineup. This one is hosted by a rotating roster of teams, introducing variety into a day with a set meal and a set television station.
High School Rivalries: The Grassroots of Thanksgiving Football
While the NFL dominates the Thanksgiving Day airwaves, high school football rivalries continue to thrive in many communities, particularly in the Northeast. High school football games played on Thanksgiving are often called a Turkey Day Game or a Turkey Bowl, as Americans typically eat turkeys on Thanksgiving, although the title varies with each game.
The custom dates back more than 100 years and is particularly prevalent in the Northeast. This list is sorted alphabetically, first by state, and then by school, with team leading the series listed first wherever possible. State and regional championship tournaments are listed ahead of rivalries. If the rivalry involves two states, the rivalry is listed under the school whose state comes first alphabetically.
Connecticut:
- Ansonia vs. Naugatuck: Ansonia High School and Naugatuck High School have played each other since 1900. Ansonia leads the series, 72-35-11, as of 2016.
- Darien vs. New Canaan: The Darien vs. New Canaan Thanksgiving matchup is generally considered the most competitive and significant rivalry game in the state, pitting Connecticut's two best teams against each other. The Darien Blue Wave and the New Canaan Rams have been rivals since 1928, their first meeting. The game has been played on Thanksgiving since 1994, with New Canaan leading the Turkey Bowl series 14-9-1 and the overall series 51-38-2.
Maryland:
- Loyola Blakefield vs. Calvert Hall College: Loyola Blakefield and Calvert Hall College, both private high schools in Towson, Maryland have played an annual football game on Thanksgiving Day known as the "Turkey Bowl." The 100-year-old tradition is the oldest continuous Catholic prep-school football rivalry in the United States. As of the 2023 edition, The Loyola Dons have the overall lead over the Calvert Hall Cardinals in the Turkey Bowl, with a record of 53-44-8.
- Baltimore Polytechnic Institute (Poly) vs. Baltimore City College (City): In 1889, the game was played between City and Poly, then located on Courtland Street just a short distance from City. This led to one of the longest continuous public high school American football rivalry in the nation. The Thanksgiving tradition ended in 1993 when both City and Poly joined the Maryland Public Secondary Schools Athletic Association which held its playoffs during the Thanksgiving week, requiring both schools to move their rivalry to a date three weeks earlier.
Massachusetts: In Massachusetts, where high school football is not nearly the draw it is in other parts of the country, the Thanksgiving Day game is a long-standing tradition that brings out thousands of alumni and other fans.
- Abington vs. Whitman-Hanson: Abington High School and Whitman-Hanson Regional High School have faced off on Thanksgiving Day since 1910. The 100th meeting between these two schools was played at Whitman in 2010.
- Beverly vs. Salem: Salem High School and Beverly High School have played each other since 1891.
- Durfee vs. New Bedford: New Bedford High School and B.M.C. Durfee of Fall River have contested this rivalry since 1893.
- English vs. Latin (Boston): The rivalry between English High School of Boston and Boston Latin School dates to 1887.
- Fitchburg vs. Leominster: Leominster High School and Fitchburgh High School have played since 1894.
- Newton North vs. Newton South: These two teams have been duking it out on Turkey Day since 1894, and is one of the oldest traditions in Massachusetts.
- Winchester vs. Woburn: Winchester High School and Woburn Memorial High School's football teams have played each other 120 times since their first meeting in 1891 in one of the oldest rivalries in the country. Winchester leads the all-time 55-53-12.
Missouri: Webster Groves vs. Kirkwood: The contest between Kirkwood High School's Pioneers and Webster Groves High School's Statesmen, two teams based in the suburbs of St. Louis, is the longest running high school football rivalry west of the Mississippi River.
New Jersey: Phillipsburg vs. Easton: Phillipsburg High School and Easton High School have been playing each other since 1905 in a rivalry billed as The State Line Game. The first Thanksgiving Day meeting was in 1916 and the schools have played each other annually ever since. The winner of the game is presented with the Forks of the Delaware Trophy, as both schools are located from different states (Phillipsburg from NJ, Easton from PA) on opposite sides of the Delaware River.
These are just a few examples of the many high school football rivalries that take place on Thanksgiving Day. These games are a testament to the enduring power of local traditions and the importance of community in American life.
Modern Thanksgiving Football: A Multi-Billion Dollar Spectacle
Today, Thanksgiving football is a multi-billion dollar spectacle that draws millions of viewers each year. The NFL's three Thanksgiving Day games are among the most-watched regular season games of the year.
The tradition has evolved over time, with the addition of halftime shows and the wearing of throwback uniforms.
From 2001 to 2003, Dallas chose to represent the 1990s Cowboys dynasty by wearing the navy "Double-Star" jersey not seen since 1995. In 2004, the team wore uniforms not seen since 1963. In 2009, to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the AFL, both Dallas and Oakland played in a "AFL Legacy Game."
In 2015, the Cowboys resurrected their 1994 white "Double-Star" jerseys only this time wore them with white pants as part of the league's Color Rush, a trial run of specially designed, monochromatic jerseys to be worn during Thursday games. In 2001-2004, and again in 2008, 2010, 2017, 2018, 2020 and 2023 the Detroit Lions have worn throwback uniforms based on their very early years.
In 1997, the Salvation Army began the tradition of kicking off its Christmas Kettle campaign during halftime of the Dallas game. The campaign kickoff event includes a halftime show by a major recording artist, with halftime concerts also eventually being added to the Detroit game.
The games are a major source of revenue for the NFL and its broadcast partners. The originally scheduled 2020 primetime divisional rivalry game between the Baltimore Ravens and the Pittsburgh Steelers was postponed to Sunday, November 29 and eventually again to Wednesday, December 2.
On November 11, 2022, the league announced that the Thanksgiving games would be branded as the "John Madden Thanksgiving Celebration", honoring the memory of head coach and broadcaster John Madden.
College Football's Thanksgiving Presence Today
While the NFL has largely taken over Thanksgiving Day, college football still maintains a presence, albeit a diminished one. The Egg Bowl between Mississippi State and Ole Miss is one of the few remaining college football games played on Thanksgiving Day. It is one of the most anticipated games of the year in Mississippi, and it is often played in front of a sold-out crowd. The Egg Bowl has been played on Thanksgiving Day every year since 1941, except for two years during World War II.
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