Formative Years

1909 - 1921

The Formative Years (1909 - 1921) is the second era of the unofficial interhall football chronology. The era begins in 1909 with the first season schedule organized under a round-robin tournament structure. It ends in 1921, which was the final year of competition before divisions and the interhall championship game was introduced.

The era encompasses the primordial years of organized interhall football, as the league expanded from four to seven active teams and the number of official games played exploded. New additions to interhall culture included the All-Interhall teams, championship trophies, and full season rundowns published in the Dome Yearbook. Halls typically fielded just a single team to represent them in competition, and that team was trained and managed by a coach appointed by the university's athletic board.

While the representative interhall squads flourished, the popularity of interclass, club, picked, and other intramural campus football teams markedly declined. The Ex-Carrollites team, arguably the most successful of the minor squads, played its last game against Brownson Hall in 1917. Various interhall "chick" teams popped up throughout the era to challenge certain rules implimented by the official interhall league, but these squads came and went with the season and disappeared altogether by World War I.

The most successful team during the era was Corby Hall, which was recognized by the Notre Dame RecSports department as the first campus dynasty. Corby won three straight titles (1909 - 1911) in the first three years of The Formative Era and went on to win an additional three championships (1916, 1919 - 1920) before the era concluded. Of the seven teams who competed, only old Carroll Hall and the Off-Campus team, both established in 1920, did not win a title.

A section of the 1916 Notre Dame Dome yearbook on Interhall Football. The first page provides the season schedule and outcomes, a picture of league champion Corby Hall, and a rundown of the season. Pictured top to bottom on page two is Walsh, Brownson, and Sorin Halls.

Key Developments

  • The first interhall schedule is released by the Scholastic (1903)

  • Round-robin scheduling is implemented (1909)

  • The number of hall teams doubles

  • Other intramural football teams on campus decline

  • All-Interhall teams are introduced

  • The interhall leagues are a full-fledged feeder system to the varsity squad, though this role begins to diminish with the first varsity Freshman football team in 1913

Notable Participants

  • Knute Rockne - coached Corby and Sorin Halls in 1912 and 1913 respectively, arguably the greatest college football coach of all time

  • Norman Barry - the only known interhaller to start on the Minims (grade school) football team and work their way up to the varsity. He then entered the NFL in 1921, playing for the Chicago Cardinals, Green Bay Packers, and the Milwaukee Brewers. He became head coach of the Cardinals in 1925 and led them to an NFL championship.

Teams

Established

  • Walsh Hall - 1909

  • Badin Hall - 1917 - hall established 1897 as St. Joseph

  • Old Carroll Hall - 1920 - first year as undergraduate dormitory

  • The Off-Campus team - 1920

Disbanded

  • St. Joseph Hall Manual Labor School - 1916 - replaced by Badin Hall, an undergraduate dormitory