The quote was from the Sterling Illinois Evening Gazette, November 26, 1909.   Those words about giant’s spoke of one of the best teams in Wisconsin that year.  Much more on Monroe later. Sorry for you, the reader, to make such a long about story but as I got into the history of Monroe 1909, I found that there was a lot of important contexts to show not only the Wisconsin landscape, that of Illinois and a bit nationally. 1909 was a year for many teams to challenge for the myt

Prior to the matchup against a 3-3-0 Winona Cotter, played in Winona, there was a twist in the A.P. polls.  In the recent poll Gale-Ettrick stayed #1 with Alma moving up to #4 in the “others”.  But there was a new wrinkle to the polls.   Kewaunee, which had been #10 in the Big Ten A.P. poll had notified the WIAA that their enrollment had dropped and they now had 592 students, eight under the minimum for the A.P. Big Ten poll so they were dropped to the Little Ten and as it tu

When looking at season final A.P. or U.P.I. football rankings (1958-1975) you can look at the bottom of each list and if there isn’t a press recap you might miss some information.  Did that #9 team lose their last game and they ended 7-1-0 or 7-1-1?  If they dropped because of a game nine loss, where were they before in the week eight poll?  Did the team replace a squad that dropped down to the honorable mention list because of wacky pollsters voting?  There could be a number