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About Medford mail tribune. (Medford, Or.) 1909-1989 | View Entire Issue (Sept. 29, 1963)
SPORTS The head coach of Army, one of the nation's best, answers a perennial parent question: jQJ Your Boy Play Football? By PAUL DIETZEL Should your boy play football? For that matter, should any boy play football? I can't honestly say to you: "Yes!" I don't know your boy. But I can say this to you: "Al most every boy who is physically able should play football." President Kennedy and President Eisen hower before him warned the nation's youth that it was becoming soft and sedentary. Wher ever possible, boys should be active participants, not side-line spectators. Football, of course, means sweat and labor and often tears. But it is one of the best tests of personal abilities including determination and fighting spirit. On a bronze plaque outside Michie Stadium at West Point is written : "I want an officer for a secret and dangerous mission. I want a West Point football player." That statement was made by Gen. George C. Marshall, then chief of staff of the U.S. Army in World War II. Another general once told me his only prob lem with former athletes during the Korean war was that he had to hold them back by the shirt tail. Ma.. young men who had been brilliant in the classroom were busy looking up the cor rect procedures when circumstances called for leadership by action. This ability to take over when leadership is needed is an asset constantly nurtured on the field of play. But will your boy be injured playing football? Ho might. He might also get hurt driving around in the family car. Statistics show that in the 15- to 21-year age group automobile deaths lead football fatalities by hundreds to one. The bruises he'll receive playing football can be painful, but there will always be a doctor avail able, and with present medical and training tech niques, most athletic injuries heal completely in less than three months. Who should play football? 1. Only boys who want to play football not boys whose fathers want them on the field. 2. Only boys physically fit. A doctor should check prospective players. 3. Only boys in good condition. It's not enough to train a week before the season. Condition ing is a year-round necessity. For pre-teen-agers boys between seven and 12 contact sports should be supervised. Com petition is an essential part of every child's ed ucation, but it must be allowed to develop nor mally, with competition and cooperation as bal anced forces in his personality. Athletics need to be as carefully supervised as other parts of his education are. IN ADDITION, the American Medical Association discourages interschool and intercommunity contact sports for children in the, pre-teen group. The pre-teen's excitement should come only from playing and playing only because he likes to play, not to satisfy desires of adults or to be exploited by them. As a parent of a football-playing boy, you have a right to demand certain conditions of his school. Perhaps the most important is that there be a physician as well as a trainer on duty. The best equipment should be provided as well. If your school can't afford the best, your school can't afford football. Until a few years ago, the first game of the season was scheduled after only a few days' practice. The greatest number of injuries oc curred in these early games when players were not properly conditioned. Now a minimum of three weeks' conditioning should precede the first game, with a suitable number of practice periods before the first contact scrimmage. When all the requirements I've mentioned requirements of boy and school are met, then I'd say your boy should play football. I feel that today's adult world tells youngsters to get by with as little effort as possible, to take care of "No. 1" (yourself) first, to sit back and let the "other guy" do it. Those are unhealthy ideas to carry into adulthood. But if a boy goes out for football .and sticks to it, he is not likely to become a selfish slacker. There's no place in football for that kind. Football can make your boy a champion. If he's willing to be the first guy on the practice field every day and if he works at being the best on the field, if he's willing to learn that the team comes before any personal glory and if he's willing to give any time the team asks, then win or lose your boy is a champion I COVER: Teen-ape actress llayley Mills has a daz zling film career before her (she plays her first groum-up role in "The Chalk Gar den"), and no small credit goes to "The Woman Behind liayley Mills," page It. Family Weekly LEONARD 5 DAVIDOW Pnnint and FMi,K WAITER C DREYFUS Vtfr Prmrfrttt RATRICK I OROURKt AivrrtMQ f,rri-!r MOITON FRANK Oirwlo, of P,bli,l,rt K,i Snd all advertitinq communication to Family Wcklv IJJ N. Michigan Ay., Chtcogo I, Hi. ft i Sfplember i, 196J Addnm all communication! about editorial ftaturyt to family Weekly, 60 E. Soth St.. Nw Yatk 22. N. If . IK). FROCESSINO AND IOOKS. INC., Board of Editors I ERNEST V. HEYN EHUtr-in-Chirl IEN KARTMAN Sctnti" M"' ROBERT FIT20IMON Maal"H rMllllr DYKSTRA Art DirKtor MEIANIE 01 PROFT Food SM" Rotary Abcvoya, Ardon lld.ll. Hal london. Jack Ryan; root J. Oppwh.lmt, Hotlywc IM N. Michigan A... Chicago I. III. All right! rrorvod.
