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  • The Harold “Red” Grange Collection:Wheaton College
  • Scott A. G. M. Crawford

The 1920s was the “Golden Age of Sport.” Babe Ruth hit three home runs in a 1926 World Series game, Man O’ War streaked to a win in the 1920 Belmont Stakes, and Jack Dempsey and Gene Tunney’s classic heavyweight bout attracted 135,000 spectators.

On October 18, 1924, the landscape of American sport experienced a seismic shift that headlined college sport. The venue was the opening of the new $1,700,000 Illinois Memorial Stadium. A crowd of 67,000 gathered to see Michigan play Illinois. An Associated Press columnist, in his opening salvo, described an astonishing afternoon of college sport in which a Midwestern student suddenly found himself in the role of hero, icon, and celebrity: “A flashing, red-haired youngster, running and dodging with the speed of a deer gave [the crowd] . . . the thrill of their lives today when Illinois vanquished Michigan 39 to 14.” Harold “Red” Grange scored six touchdowns.

Wheaton College’s Grange collection contains boxes of secondary sources that range from information on the boyhood of “the Galloping Ghost” in Wheaton to his impact on college and professional football to his long career as a business insurance representative and entertainment luminary.

For the historian eager to delve into Grange’s storied athletic career at the University of Illinois, there is a 169-page index to a rich trove of more than two thousand newspaper clippings compiled by Joseph Newlan. While some of the materials are clearly labeled and cited, there are others—such as a series of scrapbooks—that offer up a tantalizing note of “A Chicago Newspaper” but fail to identify exactly which one. For example, there is a fascinating narrative put together by Betty Walker, dated October 18, 1924. The specific newspaper is not cited, but the piece stands nicely as one fragment of many that cast Grange as a campus colossus:

A lanky youth in khaki pants whose chief adornment was the great big orange 77 on his sweater today stood out as a living hero in the University of Illinois’ stadium to her heroic dead. . . . While the stone columns dedicated to those heroes of yesterday stood their immortal guard over the heroes of tomorrow this red headed hero of today ran the five touchdowns. . . . [This] game saw “Red” Grange of Wheaton win undying fame and glory as an Illini football warrior.

Aside from files of news clippings, the collection includes audiotapes, clipping files, correspondence, ephemera, essays, interviews, memorabilia, photograph albums, scrap-books, and speeches.

A highlight is the collection’s over five hundred photographs. Box 23 is a wonderfully eclectic assortment that includes a celebrity cavalcade photograph with Grange standing beside Babe Ruth, Jack Dempsey, and Grantland Rice. It also features a photo of a senior citizen Grange greeted by a group of Wheaton Central cheerleaders after returning “home.”

The archive also showcases Grange’s ability to advertise and sell all manner of goods. Box 34 has a September 14, 1926, edition of The Humboldt Times that describes how every [End Page 327] clothing purchase at the Federal Outfitting Company would earn a Red Grange Scholastic Football. There is also an advertisement claiming that Grange used a Homko power grass cutter. Elsewhere in the collection are many examples of Grange’s business acumen, such as Box 41 (a Grange doll), Box 42 (a Grange Wheaties bowl), Box 43 (a Grange Franklin Mint coin), Box 20 (Grange endorsements for Lucky Strike cigarettes and Jim Beam alcohol), and Box 46 (a Grange Coca-Cola bottle commemorating seventy-five years of football at the University of Illinois).

Box 36 allows researchers to enjoy listening to Grange’s reminiscences about his famed ice job as a youth in Wheaton or his thoughts on “Career and Football Values to Youth.” His conversational patter is engaging and full of good cheer. The absence of bluster and conceit makes the legendary figure a likeable communicator.

Box 34 has two pencil drawings of Grange done by Robert Riger for a Sports Illustrated special titled “The Five Immortals.” One shows Grange wearing the once-traditional gridiron leather skullcap and looking like a Hollywood leadi;ng man...

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