He got his job at the Point through the bandaging of Ty Cobb’s ankle.  An Army coach saw him do it and said: 

“Harry, if you can do that, the way you do it, come to West Point and do it for us.”

Tuthill was none too welcome to the authorities other than the football men.  In the eyes of the superintendent every cadet was fit to do anything that might be required of him.

“You’ve got to make good with the Supe,” said the coaches.

So Harry went out and watched the dress parade and the ensuing double time review.  After the battalion was dismissed, Tuthill was introduced to the Superintendent.

“Well, Mr. Tuthill,” said the Superintendent, “I’m glad to meet you, but I really do not see what we need of a trainer.”

Harry shifted his feet and gathering courage blurted out: 

“Run those boys around again and then ask them to whistle.”

* * * * *

There are many other trainers who deserve mention in this chapter, men who are earnestly and loyally giving up their lives to the training of the young men in our different colleges, but space will not permit to take up any more of these interesting characters.  Their tribute must be a silent one, not only from myself but from the undergraduates and graduates of the colleges to which they belong and upon whose shoulders are heaped year after year honors which are due them.

FIRST DOCTOR IN CHARGE OF ANY TEAM

Doctor W. M. Conant, Harvard ’79, says: 

“I believe I was the first doctor associated with the Harvard team, and so far as I know, the first doctor who was in charge of any team at any college.  At Harvard this custom has been kept up.  I was requested by Arthur Cumnock, who had been beaten the previous year by Yale, to come out and help him win a game.  This I consented to do provided I had absolute control of the medical end of the team, which consisted not only of taking care of the men who were injured, but also of their diet.  This has since been taken up by the trainer.

“The late George Stewart and the late George Adams were the coaches in charge that year, and my recollections of some of the difficulties that arose because of new methods are very enjoyable—­even at this late day.  So far as I know this was the first season men were played in the same position opposite one another.  In other words, there was an attempt to form a second eleven—­which is now a well recognized condition.

“I had a house built under the grandstand where every man from our team was stripped, rubbed dry and put into a new suit of clothes, also given a certain amount of hot drink as seemed necessary.  This was a thing which had never been done before, and in my opinion had a large influence in deciding the game in Harvard’s favor; as the men went out upon the field in the second half almost as fresh as when they started the first half.