Professional football began November 12, 1892 when the Allegheny Athletic Association football team defeated The Pittsburg Athletic Club. William “Pudge” Heffelfinger was paid $500 to play the game. Football’s origin stemmed from two sports soccer and rugby. On November 6, 1869, Rutgers and Princeton played what would become the first college football game. Meanwhile athletic clubs were sponsoring a great variety of sports teams which became very popular after the Civil War. One of the sports they sponsored was football.
In the 1880’s a great rugby palyer from Yale, Walter Camp, created the rules changes that slowly transformed rugby into American Football. By this time most athletic clubs had a football team. The competition was fierce and each team wanted to have the best players. Football players were supposed to be amateurs. They couldn’t pay them so the club’s tried other method to latch onto the best players. Some clubs got jobs for their star players. Others awarded trophies and expensive watches, which would be pawned after the game. A popular scheme was to double the expense money for their services. Thus all of this competition eventually led to William Heffelfinger being paid to play and the rest is history.
