ALFRED MORGAN.
Champion Interscholastic Skater N.Y.I.S.A.A.
Alfred Morgan, of De La Salle, won the 220 trial and the two-mile with ease, and in the quarter he almost lapped his field, and, mistaking the finish, he stopped. Realizing his mistake as soon as the field had rushed past, he plunged ahead again, and making a hard spurt managed to secure second place, which gave him a chance in the finals.
In the finals the finishing of the second and third men was in almost every instance more exciting than that of first and second, because Morgan was so far superior to the other skaters. In the 220 he was the quickest to get in motion when the pistol was fired, set a clipping pace, and won easily by twenty yards. Pitizipio beat Goulding for the place by five yards. Goulding was fortunate in getting third prize, as he slipped and fell five yards from the finish, but managed to slide across the tape in time. In the two-mile Morgan came in fully three laps ahead of the second man.
Morgan has great speed, and is particularly quick in getting off the mark. His time in the 440 comes very near to the world's in-door record. In practice Donohue has only been able to beat Morgan by about two feet in a 220 race. Morgan is not yet nineteen years old, and besides being the best skater in the schools, he is pitcher of the De La Salle nine, and a speedy bicycle-rider.
The turns in the track at the 107th Street rink are very sharp, and a number of the skaters were bowled over like tenpins at the corners. On a longer track the time might have been a trifle better. But even so, next year the scholastic competitors will have pretty high records to beat. De La Salle won the cup which was offered to the school making the largest number of points, by scoring 14. The next highest score was 6 points.
The officers of the National Interscholastic Association have finally decided to ask the New Manhattan Athletic Club to take charge of their first field meeting—upon the success of which so much depends—and the club has undertaken the task. I think the school athletes of the country are to be congratulated upon this move, for the financial element of the enterprise has now been entirely eliminated so far as they are concerned, and this is one of the greatest advantages that could be wished for.
That the National Association has done a clever thing in getting the N.M.A.C., or rather, the Athletic Manager of the club, to superintend and arrange these games is proved by the fact that for some time past the Inter-collegiate Association has been negotiating with the club to achieve this same end. But the governors of the N.M.A.C., in their endeavors to assist in the promotion of pure sport, have decided not to attempt more than they can handle at the outset, and believing that the schools deserve more of them than the colleges, they will, I believe, give their time and assistance this year to the latter only.
And at this point let me give the readers of this Department a little glance into the inside history of the negotiations which have just ended between the National Association and the club. It will give them a better idea than anything else could, I think, of the spirit which is to pervade the management of scholastic affairs in the future. When the officers of N.I.S.A.A. went to the managers of the N.M.A.C. they explained what they wanted, and they talked about gate receipts and medals and percentage, and all that sort of thing, and the word "dollars" was used a good deal more than the word "sport." That was all very well and entirely excusable, because the officers felt a certain responsibility in the matter, and they knew they could not secure grounds and prizes for nothing, and perhaps they allowed the latter factors to assume a greater importance than they deserve.
The managers of the club, however, who are ranged in opposition to the financial element in athletics, replied that they would make no agreement whatever with N.I.S.A.A. on a dollars and cents basis. They said they would take charge of the games if the association so desired, and they agreed to carry out the athletic plans of the association to the best of their ability and to the satisfaction of the scholastic representatives, but they firmly refused to enter into any contract or to discuss any question involving money matters. They stated that their purpose was to get the element of dollars and cents as far separate from that of sport as it was possible to do, and expressed a willingness to go ahead at once on that basis.