waited gymnasium and athletic field. In
contrast to the modern student journals, the earliest files of the
_Chronicle_ are distinguished by their exceedingly rare references to
athletic events, and then only in a very occasional modest item giving
the immodest score of some class contest, such as the baseball game
between '71 and '72 on May 29, 1869, when the score ran 50 to 36.
Shortly after this time came the first student athletic organization,
informally known as the "Baseball Clubs" which became the Baseball
Association in 1876. A similar Football Association was organized in
1873 and continued until 1878 when both clubs were merged in the first
Athletic Association of the University. This was the organization
responsible for the student fund for the Gymnasium. But successful as
the new organization proved in financial matters, it soon fell into the
almost inevitable desuetude of so many student undertakings and
finally, in 1884, fell "victim of the football and baseball teams which
it sought to control."

Its successor was the present Athletic Association, organized in 1890
through a consolidation of all the athletic interests in the University.
This Association was long maintained almost exclusively by the students
whose voluntary membership was marked by a little "athletic button" of
varying design, without which no student in good standing with his
fellows would be seen. With the establishment of a general athletic fee,
or "blanket tax," by the University in 1912, which admitted the student
to all athletic events and was paid with the other University fees, and
with the growing influence of the Board in Control of Athletics, the
character of the Athletic Association gradually changed. However, the
organization still continues to elect its officers and Board of
Directors, who elect the three student representatives on the Board in
Control from a list of six nominated by the Board. The student managers
of the athletic teams are now appointed by the coach, the captain of the
team and the retiring manager. Since 1899 the general direction of the
affairs of the Athletic Association has been in the hands of two men,
Charles Baird, '95, who was appointed Graduate Director of Athletics in
that year, and Phillip G. Bartelme, a former member of the class of '99,
who succeeded him in 1909, and now holds the title of Director of
Outdoor Athletics.

The first attempt at organized collegiate sport in the University dates
f