“One friendship was made in these years that has been worth more than words can tell.  I refer to that of Matthew McClung.  To be known as a co-official with McClung was a privilege that only those who knew him can appreciate.  I had known him before at Lehigh in his undergraduate days, and had played on the same teams with him.  In after years we were officials together in a great many of the big games where feeling ran high and manliness and fairness, as well as judgment, were often put to a pretty severe test at short notice.  Never was there a squarer sportsman, or a fairer, more conscientious and efficient official; nor a truer, more gallant type of real man than he.  His early death took out of the game a man of the kind we can ill afford to lose and no tribute that I could pay him would be high enough.

“One night after a Yale-Harvard game at Cambridge, I was boarding the midnight train for New York.  The porter had my bag, and as we entered the car, he confided in me, in an almost awestruck tone, that:  ’Dad dere gentlemin in de smokin’ compartment am John L. Sullivan.’

“I crept into my berth, but next morning, in the washroom, I recognized John L. as the only man left.  He emerged from his basin and asked: 

“‘Were you at that football game yesterday?’ and then ‘Who won?’

“I told him, and by way of making conversation, asked him if he was interested in all those outdoor games.  But his voice dropped to the sepulchral and confidential, as he said: 

“‘There’s murder in that game!’

“I answered:  ‘Well!  How about the fighting game?’

“He came back with:  ’Sparring!  It doesn’t compare in roughness, or danger, with football.  In sparring you know what you are doing.  You know what your opponent is trying to do, and he’s right there in front of you, and, there’s only one!  But in football!  Say, there’s twenty-two people trying to do you!’

“There being only twenty-one other than the player concerned, I could not but infer that he meant to indicate the umpire as the twenty-second.”

My Personal Experiences

In my experience as an official I recall the fact that I began officiating as a Referee, and had been engaged and notified in the regular way to referee the Penn’-Harvard game on Franklin Field in 1905.  When I arrived at the field, McClung was the other official.  He had never umpired but had always acted as a Referee.  In my opinion a man should be either Referee or Umpire.  Each position requires a different kind of experience and I do not believe officials can successfully interchange these positions.  Those who have officiated can appreciate the predicament I was in, especially just at that time when there was so much talk of football reform, by means of changing the rules, changing the style of the game, stopping mass plays.  However, I consented; for appreciating that McClung was sincere in his statement that he would do nothing but referee, I was forced to accept the Umpire’s task.