Football Squad Colored YMCA
Item
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Title
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Football Squad Colored YMCA
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Description
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YMCA Football team, champions in 1908. Although the team carried the "Princeton YMCA" name, its players were not affiliated with Princeton University but rather with the local Black YMCA chapter.
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The team’s formation was part of a broader tradition of African American sports clubs that operated separately from predominantly white institutions due to racial segregation. The photograph was taken in front of the Witherspoon School on the corner of Witherspoon and Maclean Streets (“I_5_005 - [YMCA Football Team, 1908] | Historical Society of Princeton,” n.d.). Later, the building was known as Frederick Douglas Hall.
Prof. Charles RobertThompson pictured second from the left on the back row, served as a principal of the Witherspoon School for Colored Children in Princeton, New Jersey, during the early 1900s. The school, established in 1858 (formerly called the Quarry School) provided education to over 200 African-American students from kindergarten through eighth grade, residing in both Princeton Borough and Township (The Waxwood 2017).
Details about other African American athletes, like Hannibal James and Tom "Dewey" Moore, Sr., beyond their involvement with the football team are scarce in the available records. However, a 1910 United States Census record for an Edward (Eddie) Moore who lived on Witherspoon Street indicated he was married to an older woman (Anna), earned a wage as a waiter in a local hotel and owned his home at 101 Witherspoon Street (1910 United States Federal Census - Ancestry.com, n.d.).
Names of players and further description on reverse, see page 2.
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Contributor
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Historical Society of Princeton
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Date Created
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c. 1908
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Creator
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Unknown
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Rights
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This work is believed to be in the Public Domain under the laws of the United States. For more information, see http://rightsstatements.org/page/NoC-US/1.0/
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Identifier
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I_5_005
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Format
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Image
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Extent
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2, front and back
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Spatial Coverage
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Princeton, NJ
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Subject
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Football players
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Black people
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African Americans
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Young Men's Christian Association of the City of New York. Colored Men's Branch
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Discrimination in sports
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Racism in sports
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Photography
