SASH Sessions

EP 20: Great Lakes Soccer from the 1880s to the 1930s and the Emergence of the Intercity League (September 2022)

Host Tom McCabe is joined by Craig Tower for a discussion of soccer in the Great Lakes region, 1880s-1930.
While the Great Lakes is now seen as a cradle of traditionally “American” sports — gridiron football, baseball, and basketball — the history of intercity soccer and efforts to form a Midwest intercity league go back to the 19th century. The roots of the sport predate the modern rules of association football, and the game was played throughout the region, well beyond St. Louis and Chicago which have long been recognized for their soccer communities. From urban centers like Cincinnati to relatively obscure locales like East Liverpool, Ohio and Muncie, Indiana, soccer found a home in the Great Lakes States of the Midwest.
After years of efforts to launch competitive intercity play, in 1929, a six-team USFA-sanctioned professional league was formed in three U.S. cities with long-standing multi-tiered amateur and semi-pro leagues and soccer histories, each dating back to at least 1890. The cities in the league were the economic powerhouses of Chicago, Detroit, and Cleveland – the 2nd, 4th, and 6th largest cities in the nation by population. The teams were competitive, challenging Eastern professional sides for the US Open Cup; stealing stars from the ASL, Europe, Canada, and each other; going toe-to-toe with teams from Europe and Latin America; and placing players on the 1930 US National team which reached the semifinals of the World Cup. The league and the teams innovated, playing a mixed schedule with both a regular season and a tournament structure, experimenting with indoor games and under lights, and expanded existing soccer networks in the Midwest, Middle Europe, Canada, and Latin America.
Podcast produced by Brian Quarstad.
Music created by LiteSaturation and found at Pixabay.
View the video of the session at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zjBhCvlSsvs&list=PLF9oL3yRaMyyYqsS1Qqj6XxUV8RU6p4tC&index=21&pp=iAQB
For more US soccer history, visit the SASH website at https://www.ussoccerhistory.org/

EP 19: 50th Anniversary of the New York Cosmos first NASL Championship (August 2022)

New York Cosmos historian and SASH director Dr. David Kilpatrick hosts a roundtable discussion with New York Cosmos alumni Randy Horton, Josef Jelinek, Werner Roth, and John O’Reilly on the occasion of the 50th anniversary of the team’s first North American Soccer league (NASL) championship. 
Podcast produced by Brian Quarstad.
Music created by LiteSaturation and found at Pixabay.
View the video of the session at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UmvRJoZrK4w&list=PLF9oL3yRaMyyYqsS1Qqj6XxUV8RU6p4tC&index=19&pp=iAQB
For more US soccer history, visit the SASH website at https://www.ussoccerhistory.org/

EP 18: Anglo-American Football History Before 1850 (July 2022)

Host Tom McCabe is joined by Tom Langton for a discussion on Anglo-American football history before 1850.
Tom is the son of the accomplished British sports journalist and sports art and history aficionado Harry Langton (1929–2000) who established the world famous FIFA-Langton Collection, now owned by the National Football Museum Trust. Tom took over his family archives and company in 2013 as Langton Football Archives and has developed a new collection based on a range of traditional and modern themes that is used for exhibitions and displays. Tom is a biologist by profession and has particular interest in Football anthropology before 1800 and in Football Fine Art through the ages.
Tom discusses evidence of ball games across America, Europe and Asia and reflects on their relevance to the origins of Association Football or Soccer. Links between Europe (Britain especially) and North America from the late medieval period until the early 19th century are also discussed.
Podcast produced by Brian Quarstad.
Music created by LiteSaturation and found at Pixabay.
View the video of the session at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MNfQyC21OtY&list=PLF9oL3yRaMyyYqsS1Qqj6XxUV8RU6p4tC&index=18&t=2421s&pp=iAQB
For more US soccer history, visit the SASH website at https://www.ussoccerhistory.org/

EP 17: The Athletic‘s Pablo Maurer and Matt Pentz on Wee Willie McLean (June 2022)

Host Tom McCabe is joined The Athletic's Pablo Mauer and Matt Pentz to discuss their recent article, “The disappearance of Wee Willie McLean: Solving America’s oldest soccer mystery.”
William “Wee Willie” McLean was born in Scotland at the beginning of the 20th century. A speedy winger, Wee Willie’s dominant play in Chicago and St. Louis led to multiple league and U.S. Open Cup titles during the 1930s. His stellar play also earned him a spot on the U.S. Men’s National Team’s World Cup squad in 1934. McLean disappeared without a trace in 1938.
Podcast produced by Brian Quarstad.
Music created by LiteSaturation and found at Pixabay.
View the video of the session at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C5wwxC8WJZM&list=PLF9oL3yRaMyyYqsS1Qqj6XxUV8RU6p4tC&index=17&pp=iAQB
For more US soccer history, visit the SASH website at https://www.ussoccerhistory.org/

EP 16: A Book Talk with Michael Lewis, author of ”Alive and Kicking: The incredible but true story of the Rochester Lancers” (June 2022)

Host TOm McCabe is joined by author Michael Lewis, who discusses his new book, Alive and Kicking: The incredible but true story of the Rochester Lancers
Lewis covered the team from 1974-1980 for the Rochester Democrat and Chronicle, documenting all the ups and downs of Rochester’s only major league sports franchise. Using his own reporting, recent interviews with the men who lived the dream with the Lancers, and painstaking research of matches when many detailed records were not kept, Lewis has pulled together the complete and remarkable history of the Rochester Lancers on a match-by-match basis.
Included in the book are behind the scenes stories that have never been told about the ASL and NASL days and profiles of the players who proudly took the field at Aquinas/Holleder Stadium.
Podcast produced by Brian Quarstad.
Music created by LiteSaturation and found at Pixabay.
View the video of the session at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AITNjtSLbmg&list=PLF9oL3yRaMyyYqsS1Qqj6XxUV8RU6p4tC&index=16&pp=iAQB
For more US soccer history, visit the SASH website at https://www.ussoccerhistory.org/

EP 15: ASL 100 (May 2022)

Tom McCabe hosts presentations in recognition of the 100th anniversary of the first American Soccer League season.
The ASL100 presenters are:
Dan Creel on the Fall River Rovers and Fall River United situation in the inaugural 1921-22 season
Gabe Logan on the “overlooked” 1924-25 National Challenge Cup Championship
James Brown presents a spotlight on Ernő Schwarcz
Podcast produced by Brian Quarstad.
Music created by LiteSaturation and found at Pixabay.
View the video of the session at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Eyp6_2bqrJk&list=PLF9oL3yRaMyyYqsS1Qqj6XxUV8RU6p4tC&index=15&pp=iAQB
For more US soccer history, visit the SASH website at https://www.ussoccerhistory.org/

EP 14: Research Roundtable

The idea behind the “Research Roundtable” is to provide a forum for SASH members to discuss their current research projects and connect with other researchers who may be able to share useful advice and information.
The presenters for the inaugural Research Roundtable, hosted by Tom McCabe, are:
Steven Torres, president of the Association of North, Central America & The Caribbean Football Investigators, on the 60th anniversary of the first official club tournament in Concacaf, the Champions’ Cup (1962-2008), predecessor of the Concacaf Champions League
Chuck Carlson on soccer in the coalfields of Illinois from 1880s to 1920s
Bob Gansler on German-language newspaper coverage of Milwaukee’s soccer scene. By the 1930s, German immigrants were making their mark on Milwaukee soccer and two German-language newspapers — Milwaukee Deutscher Zeitung and Milwaukee Herold — covered the scene. Bob will discuss how he finds, saves, translates, and collates information from these valuable resources
Podcast produced by Brian Quarstad.
Music created by LiteSaturation and found at Pixabay.
View the video of the session at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jEEWnZ1k-5g&list=PLF9oL3yRaMyyYqsS1Qqj6XxUV8RU6p4tC&index=14&pp=iAQB
For more US soccer history, visit the SASH website at https://www.ussoccerhistory.org/

EP 13: Soccer Frontiers Book Talk (January 2022)

Host Tom McCabe is joined by Chris Bolsmann and George Kioussis, editors of Soccer Frontiers: The Global Game in the United States, 1863–1913 (2021, University of Tennessee Press).
Soccer Frontiers examines the early history of soccer in the United States, which has received relatively little scholarly attention. Soccer Frontiers helps to fill this gap and correct the widespread notion that soccer was unfamiliar in the United States before the late twentieth century.
A number of SASH members are contributors to the book.
Chris and George are both professors in the Department of Kinesiology at California State University, Northridge.
Chris is coauthor, with Dilwyn Porter, of English Gentlemen and World Soccer: Corinthians, Amateurism and the Global Game and coeditor of two books with Peter Alegi: Africa’s World Cup: Critical Reflections on Play, Patriotism, Spectatorship, and Space and South Africa and the Global Game: Football, Apartheid and Beyond.
George’s work has appeared in the Journal of Sport History, Sport in History, the International Review for the Sociology of Sport, and Soccer & Society. He currently serves as an editor for Sport in History
Podcast produced by Brian Quarstad.
Music created by LiteSaturation and found at Pixabay.
View the video of the session at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z-wZPXJo7Sg&list=PLF9oL3yRaMyyYqsS1Qqj6XxUV8RU6p4tC&index=13&t=624s&pp=iAQB
For more US soccer history, visit the SASH website at https://www.ussoccerhistory.org/
 

EP 12: A Book Talk with Brian D. Bunk, author of ”From Football to Soccer: The Early History of the Beautiful Game in the United States” (October 2021)

Tom McCabe hosts a Book Talk with Brian D. Bunk about his new book, From Football to Soccer: The Early History of the Beautiful Game in the United States (University of Illinois Press).
In From Football to Soccer, Bunk, a senior lecturer in the history department at the University of Massachusetts, examines a variety of kicking games played by native peoples and colonists alike across North America before soccer’s emergence in the late 1800s. He then discusses the development of league play in the United States, including the first professional leagues, while also recounting the beginnings of the women’s game, the impact of the First World War on soccer’s development, and the return of professionalism in the form of the American Soccer League.
Podcast produced by Brian Quarstad.
Music created by LiteSaturation and found at Pixabay.
View the video of the session at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aTo0xOQqBS0&list=PLF9oL3yRaMyyYqsS1Qqj6XxUV8RU6p4tC&index=12&t=32s&pp=iAQB
For more US soccer history, visit the SASH website at https://www.ussoccerhistory.org/

EP 11: Toffee Soccer Book Talk (May 2021)

Tom McCabe hosts a Book Talk with author, football historian, and philanthropist David Harry France, OBE, who discusses his book Toffee Soccer: Everton in North America.
Throughout the past two decades, Dr. France has been the driving force behind numerous initiatives related to Everton Football Club including Gwladys Street’s Hall of Fame, the Everton Former Players’ Foundation, the EFC Heritage Society, the Founding Fathers of Merseyside Football, and the David France Collection (now known as the Everton Collection). In January 2011, Liverpool’s Freedom of the City panel rewarded David France with the prestigious title of Citizen of Honour.
Tony Sampson also joins the discussion. A native Scouser now living in Chicago, Sampson is EFC Fans’ Forum International Lead, giving US fans a voice on club issues, as well as coordinating over 40+ supporter group leads to drive awareness and engagement.
Podcast produced by Brian Quarstad.
Music created by LiteSaturation and found at Pixabay.
View the video of the session at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XzK7i6n0pvU&list=PLF9oL3yRaMyyYqsS1Qqj6XxUV8RU6p4tC&index=11&pp=iAQB
For more US soccer history, visit the SASH website at https://www.ussoccerhistory.org/