As one visits the dressing room of the New York Giants and sees the attendant work upon the wonderful physique of Christy Mathewson, one cannot help but realize what a potent factor he must have been on Bucknell's team. When Christy played he was 6 feet tall and weighed 168 pounds stripped. He prepared at Keystone Academy, playing in the line. In 1898, when he went to Bucknell, he was immediately put at fullback and played there three years.
Fred Crolius says of him: "Of all the long distance punters with hard kicks to handle, Percy Haughton and Christy Mathewson stand out in his memory. Mathewson had the leg power to turn his spiral over. That is, instead of dropping where ordinary spirals always drop, an additional turn seemed to carry the ball over the head of the back who was waiting for the ball, often carrying some fifteen or twenty yards beyond."
Football has no more ardent admirer than Christy Mathewson. It will be interesting to hear what he has to say of his experience in the game of football.
"I liked to play football," says Mathewson. "I was a better football player than a baseball player in those days. I was considered a good punter. I was not much as a line bucker. The captain of the team always gave me a football to take with me in the summer. I occasionally had an opportunity to practice kicking after I was through with my baseball work.
"At Taunton, Mass., my first summer, I ran across a fellow who was playing third base on the team for which I was pitching. MacAndrews was his name. He was a Dartmouth man. He showed me how to kick. He showed me how to drop a spiral. I liked to drop-kick and used to practice it quite a little."
"I remember how tough it was for me when Bucknell played Annapolis the year before when the Navy team had a man who could kick such wonderful spirals. They were terribly hard to handle, and I was determined to profit by his example. So I just hung on for dear life, punting spirals all summer. Later I used to watch George Brooke punt a good deal when he was coaching."
"At that time drop kickers were not so numerous. I had some recollection of a fellow named O'Day, who had a great reputation as a drop-kicker, as did Hudson of Carlisle. In 1898 we were to play Pennsylvania. Our team served as a preliminary game for Pennsylvania. They often beat us by large scores. Since then we have had teams which made a 6 to 5 score. But they had good teams in my time. We never scored on Penn, as I recall.
"Our coach said one day, at the training table, 'I'll give a raincoat to the fellow who scores on Penn to-day.' The manager walked in and overheard his remark and added, 'Yes, and I'll give a pair of shoes to the man who makes the second score against Penn.' That put some 'pep' into us. Anyway, we were on Penn's 35-yard line and I kicked a field goal. After this we rushed the ball and got up to Penn's 40-yard line, and from there I scored again, thereby winning the shoes and the raincoat.
"I went up to Columbia one day to see them practice. It was in the days when Foster Sanford was their coach. He saw me standing on the side lines; came over to where I was; looked me over once or twice and finally said: