The general philosophy of physical education at Oberlin was first established by one of the founders of the college, a Protestant minister named John Jay Shipherd. He believed in a system of education which blended scholarly study and physical labor. Shipherd stated Oberlin's principle objectives for the manual labor program as "health, bodily, mental and moral, the student's support; and the formation of industrious and economical habits" (Shipherd, J.J., Circular: Oberlin Collegiate Institute, March 8, 1834). Under this system of manual labor, both men and women worked for approximately four hours each day. Men performed tasks such as carpentry as well as chopping and hauling wood while women cooked, did laundry, and made and mended clothing.

Although the manual labor system began to fade in the mid-nineteenth century, the general philosophy of "education through both the mind and the body" remained. The first gymnasium at Oberlin College was built in 1861 for the male students by a student Gymnasium Association. The one story building (30' x 80') was built with faculty approval, but with no financial or administrative support due to the long-standing Calvinistic tradition within which play constituted a sin and all expenditure of energies were to be constructive. The gymnasium contained ladders, swinging rings, parallel bars, dumbbells, and Indian clubs. In 1863, however, it was torn down because of a lack of funds as well as lack of use due to the Civil War. After the war, the primary organized form of exercise was military drill performed by the male students for two to three hours each day. The administration and faculty highly approved of this activity, unlike the gymnastic exercises that had been conducted in the gym, because they considered it useful--in case of fire or rebellion.

As physical activity in the form of gymnastic exercise was becoming more popular with students and somewhat tolerated by the faculty and administration, male students also began to engage in athletic games. In the early 1860's, the most popular games that were allowed at Oberlin were cricket and football. Although the administration did not view these games as useful, they allowed the students to play in Tappan field from 1:00 to 2:00 p.m. in the fall and spring, and from 4:00 to 5:00 p.m. in the summer. Football, the more popular of the two sports, was much different from the game which is played today. The players engaged in kicking, tripping, and holding, but no carrying of the ball was allowed. Another difference was that the ball itself was made of an inflated bladder, usually of a hog, as hogs were slaughtered more often than any other animal.

In the fall of 1865, baseball was introduced to Oberlin and very quickly became the most popular sport. The first baseball club was call the Penfield 9. It was named after a wagon maker who donated heavy bats made out of seasoned wagon tongues to the team. Although the faculty disapproved, this team, known for their "slugging," played various clubs from Cleveland as well as Hudson, Ohio. The second organized baseball club was called the Resolutes. Known for their outstanding fielding, they won numerous rosewood bats and silver balls at out-of-town county fairs and July 4th celebrations.

By the late 1870's, the shift from manual labor to gymnastic exercise was nearly complete. In the frontier days when the college was just getting established, student labor was needed. However, as the campus took shape, the need for student labor ended and other forms of exercise took its place. A second gym was built in 1873 by the Gymnasium Association. After operating at a deficit for four years, the faculty voted in 1877 that the college would assume responsibility for the gym and that gymnastic exercise would be required for all students, except those students who still performed at least two hours of manual labor per day.

In the fall of 1885, the first formal program of physical education at Oberlin was begun when the College hired Delphine Hanna to oversee training in health and exercise for female students. A recent study by a prominent doctor had pointed out that almost all organized physical activities (military drill and competitive games) were designed primarily to benefit men, while the needs of women were not addressed. Since the 1850's, women had engaged in calisthenics in designated rooms in both Ladies' Hall and later in Music Hall, but had never had an organized program or use of a real gymnasium. Consequently, Delphine Hanna was appointed specifically to establish a women's department of physical training. She was hired under the condition that she subsidize herself for the first year, after which Oberlin College would pay her a regular salary. With the financial help of a wealthy personal friend and contributor to Oberlin, Miss Julia Dickinson, Hanna made it through her first year with a slim budget of $300.00. She spent most of the money fixing up the women's "gymnasium" which was, at that time, a small addition (29 by 44 feet) onto the side of Ladies' Hall. It was built in 1881 to replace the earlier women's exercise space in Music Hall, which had burned the previous year. The place was quite a shambles when Hanna came; it was a small brick room with five dressing areas, graffiti on the walls, and a pile of oats in the corner.

Hanna came to Oberlin with the philosophy that both teachers and students needed instruction in physical education founded on a scientific basis. She felt that physical education was necessary for one's general health - not for mere enjoyment. In her first year, she examined and organized 125 women students into classes. In addition, she taught one class for faculty women, one for public school children, and one for male students. Although the male students had engaged in sport for a few decades, they did not have an organized program of supervised instruction. Rather than supervise them in only calisthenics exercise, Hanna also taught them the theory of physical education and systematic practice which eventually developed into a departmental major in 1901. Among the nine members of her first men's class, three students - Thomas D. Wood, Luther Halsey Gulick, and Fred E. Leonard - went on to become eminent leaders in physical education and medicine.

Hanna was the first woman in the United States to hold a college professorship in physical education. During her tenure, the subject became part of the curriculum for all Oberlin women. In 1911, freshmen were required to take one year of physical education; in 1919, the requirement was increased to two years. She also started a physical education camp. The college, the department, faculty, and friends purchased land on Lake Erie to build the Oberlin College Beach Association and Hanna Camp, where students, faculty, and alumni could enjoy outdoor activities.

When Hanna retired in 1920, her work was continued briefly by Helen Finney Cochran. When Cochran died in 1923, Gertrude Moulton became Director of the Women's Gymnasium and the Teachers Course in Physical Education for Women, serving in that capacity until 1945. Like Hanna, Moulton strove to integrate physical activities with the total well-being of the students. Moulton took women's physical education through its second phase. She was instrumental in improving physical facilities for women. With the construction of Galpin Field, the department encouraged outdoor sports; tennis courts, a golf course, and hockey fields were also added. The completion of Hales Gymnasium in 1938 provided the department with much needed space and equipment.

As women's physical education at Oberlin began to expand and become more accepted in the late 19th century, so too did men's athletics. Due to the growing popularity of baseball and Oberlin's success in the sport, the college established an athletic association in 1881 and consequently became involved in formal intercollegiate athletic competition for the first time. During the baseball seasons of 1880, 1881, and 1882, the team never lost a game. A particularly notable player during those years was Moses Fleetwood Walker, who went on to become the first Black professional baseball player in the major leagues.

The next sport to flourish at Oberlin was football. In 1881, with the new zest for competitive sports, the first interclass game of football was allowed on campus. The sport very rapidly grew in popularity until the 1890's, when it became the most popular sport at the college. Oberlin played its first intercollegiate game of football in 1891 against the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor. Despite the fact that they lost the game 26-6, supposedly due to inexperience, they left for home feeling highly satisfied because, according to some of the team members, "Most and best of all is that Ann Arbor tells us that we play the cleanest, most gentlemanly game of football they have ever seen." Their next season in 1892 and those which followed, proved to be much more victorious because an experienced coach named John Heisman was hired to organize the team. It is after him that the memorial Heisman Trophy, which is awarded every year to the most outstanding collegiate football player, is named.

With the turn of the century, there was a general expansion in all college athletics. One of the biggest developments at the time was the emergence of basketball. Basketball had been invented in 1891 by James Naismith to provide an indoor sport for men during the winter. The first basketball game at Oberlin was actually played in 1896 by women on the outdoor tennis courts that were once where Harkness Bowl now stands. Until 1901, Oberlin men only fulfilled a role as unwanted visitors at the women's games. In 1901, however, Warner Gymnasium was constructed for the men's physical education department the 1873 structure. With this new facility, the men formed their own basketball team and consequently participated in their first indoor intercollegiate sport in 1902.

By the turn of the century, Oberlin had established a strong program of athletics guided by the still standing philosophy that a healthy person must develop both the mind and the body. Great emphasis was put on the necessity of creating a balance between these two avenues for education, with no tolerance for the over-development of the body and underdevelopment of the mind. C.K. Fauver, a former Oberlin athlete from the class of 1897, reflected that "it was made absolutely essential that for participation as a representative of the college in athletics that the participant should maintain a class standing at least equal to or higher than the average college student" (Alumni Magazine, March 1914, p.163). Oberlin's notable system of management and organization of sports was recognized throughout Ohio.

With the appointment of Charles Winifred Savage as Director of Athletics and Graduate Manager of the Athletic Association in 1906, a new era began in Oberlin athletic history. Savage believed that athletics were a means of accomplishing the aims of education in general, and that the best athletic programs were those which reached the most people. He ardently spoke out against the growing trend of professionalism in collegiate athletics, as it was a manifestation of the overemphasis on the development of the body and not the mind. His views were in direct accordance with the president of the college at that time, Henry Churchill King, who enunciated Oberlin's philosophy of physical education and athletics in his 1902 inaugural address. One of Savage's most notable accomplishments during his time at Oberlin was the system of coaching that he devised under which all coaches were appointed members of the faculty with salaries on the same basis as all other members. In 1911, the first instructors in physical training under this system were appointed; Glen Gray was appointed head coach and J.H. Nichols as assistant coach.

Under King's presidency and Savage's direction, both the intercollegiate and intramural athletic programs expanded. By 1931, baseball, football, basketball, tennis, track and field, cross-country, soccer, and golf had all become varsity sports. Swimming also became popular, but not until Oberlin had the facilities to really develop the sport. The enthusiasm and need for a swimming pool were pointed out by the women students. The women's physical education department had been including swimming as part of their curriculum since the early 1920's. Since the closest pool was at the YMCA in Elyria, the students would commute each day in a bus to hold class there. In 1921, the men followed suit and began to bus students to Elyria as well. Finally in 1931, after much persuasion by the women's physical education department, Crane Pool was built. It was built for and to be supervised by the women's department. Men were allowed partial use of it. Already by the following year, Oberlin men had established their first varsity swim team.

In addition to developing intercollegiate sports, Savage expanded Oberlin's intramural athletic program. He felt that the purpose of intramural sports was to give all students a chance to compete in athletic games, not just the superior athletes. This, of course, was in accordance with his opinion that the best athletics programs were those that reached the most people. In 1929, he appointed J.H. Nichols the first Director of Intramural Athletics. Nichols developed a system called the student managerial plan whereby students managed their own teams. This system is still in effect today.

The year of 1955 represented the first official union of the men's three-fold athletic program under the direction of one man. In that year, Lysle K. Butler became Chairman of the Department of Physical Education, Intramural Athletics, and Intercollegiate Athletics. (The women's physical education department was still a separate entity consisting only of physical education classes with no competitive sports program.) Carrying on the philosophies of his predecessors in athletics and physical education, Butler strongly believed in the function of athletics as a means to educate, not as a means for publicity or to raise money. Consequently, he also believed that a good athletic program should include as many students as possible. In his first year as Director, one half of all male students at Oberlin participated in intercollegiate athletics alone, not to mention intramurals.

Butler also pushed for considerable expansion in the actual facilities for athletics. Under his direction, Oberlin added six new bowling alleys, new tennis courts, a three hole golf course and driving range, an all weather running track, and Williams Ice Rink. In addition, the outdoor athletic fields were expanded, and Hales Gymnasium was enlarged to meet some of the men's needs as well as more of the women's needs. Ultimately, Butler and his colleagues were strongly pushing for a new men's gymnasium. Finally, in 1971, Jesse Philips Physical Education Center was built with emphasis that "it was not just a gymnasium." With this new facility, Oberlin could teach handball, squash, basketball, volleyball, bowling, swimming, tennis, golf, ice skating, archery, weight-training, wrestling, fencing, shuffle-board, table-tennis, and judo.

In addition to great expansion of facilities, the decades of the sixties and the seventies saw much conflict within the physical education department. In 1965, Ruth Brunner was appointed Chairperson of the Women's Physical Education Department. Under her educational philosophy she emphasized the theory of physical education and the body more than the practice of exercising the body. Women did not have a competitive sports program that was at all comparable with the men's program. Women competed in some intramural sports, but had no varsity teams until the 1970's. In 1969, the women's department was merged with the men's department, with its faculty reduced by almost a third, at least in part because dance was removed from physical education and became part of what is now the Theater and Dance Program. Nonetheless, considering that the physical education department at Oberlin was started by a woman and specifically for women, this was a controversial and significant step.

Another issue, which arose in 1973, was over the rules of the Ohio Athletic Conference, an association of which Oberlin had been a charter member since 1902. The OAC staunchly refused to allow women to compete under their organizational direction. Suggesting that the OAC's exclusion of women could be a legal matter as well as a moral issue due to Title IX of the Educational Amendments passed in 1972, Oberlin asked that an amendment to the OAC legislation be made. This request ignited heated debate which eventually led to accusations by the OAC that Oberlin just wanted to stir up trouble within the organization. In 1974, because of Oberlin's persistence, the OAC made an amendment to their constitution to allow all persons, whether male or female, to participate in the conference. (For the development of programming under Title IX, see the honors paper by Leland Brandt.)

Yet another explosive issue in the 1970's was over the appointment of Jack Scott, who was made Chairman of the Physical Education Department in the fall of 1972. Scott was an athlete, coach, and teacher, but was most well known for his writing in which he advocated a radical theory of ethics regarding athletics. He spoke out against the dehumanizing professionalism in athletics around the nation and instead wanted to promote a "brotherhood" between athletes in order to emphasize not the winning or losing of a game, but how it is played. His arguments seemed to be in line with those of King, Savage, Nichols, and Butler. However, due to his record of administration, as well as numerous personal conflicts with colleagues at Oberlin, he resigned in 1974.

In 1975, a financial conflict developed within the physical education department. While the women's athletic program was in a state of expansion, the college was making great budget cuts within the physical education department. The conflict arose over where to make the cuts. It eventually came to rest on the football team's shoulders. Acting President Ellsworth Carlson thought the budget cuts should be taken from the intercollegiate program, and football in particular, as it was one of the most financially demanding sports. However he ran into strong disagreement primarily with Jesse Philips who had donated the money for the new physical education center. This financial conflict still remains in the forefront of the physical education department's problems.

During the 1980's, a number of important developments occurred within the Department of Physical Education. One area of change was in Oberlin's membership in athletic associations. Although Oberlin still remains a member of the NCAA, it no longer participates in the OAC with which it has been affiliated for over seventy years. However, Oberlin was instrumental in forming the new North Coast Athletic Conference, which has expanded its membership in recent years.

A second area of change within the last decade has been in the status of the physical education major. In 1979, when the issue over whether or not to keep the physical education major was first presented to the college faculty, it was voted 57 to 28 to keep the major. In 1985, however, after years of controversy, the Physical Education Department itself unanimously requested the abolition of the major because, with its present staff, it could no longer sustain an academic program that met Oberlin College standards.

The most recent change within the department was decided upon in February of 1989. According to the Oberlin Observer, "The college faculty voted to make the department of physical education an administrative rather than an academic department. While its full-time members will have faculty titles and benefits, including sabbatical leaves, they will be members of the administrative and professional staff and will not have tenure. The motion to make this change was brought by the college faculty council and endorsed by the department of physical education."

DEPARTMENT OF PHYSICAL EDUCATION FOR WOMEN

Director of the Women's Gymnasium, 1887-1955

1887-1897 Delphine Hanna
1903-1920 Delphine Hanna
1911-1913 Helen Finney Cochran, Acting
1920-1923 Helen Finney Cochran
1923-1945 Gertrude Moulton
1946-1954 Lera B. Curtis
1954-1955 Betty F. McCue

Director, Department of Physical Training for Women, 1887-1903

1887-1903 Delphine Hanna

Director, Teachers Course in Physical Education for Women, 1904-1936

1904-1920 Delphine Hanna
1911-1912 Helen Finney Cochran, Acting
1920-1923 Helen Finney Cochran
1923-1936 Gertrude Moulton

Chair, Department of Physical Education for Women, 1955-1970

1955-1964 Betty F. McCue
1964-1965 Helen Domonkos, Acting
1965-1970 Ruth Brunner

DEPARTMENT OF PHYSICAL EDUCATION FOR MEN

Director, Men's Gymnasium, 1888-1951

1888-1889 Fred E. Leonard
1892-1922 Fred E. Leonard
1923-1951 Whitelaw Reid Morrison

Director of Athletics, 1905-1970

1905-1918 Charles W. Savage
1918-1920 T. Nelson Metcalf
1920-1935 Charles W. Savage
1935-1955 John Herbert Nichols
1938-1939 Lysle K. Butler, Acting
1971-1972 Julian L. Smith
1972-1974 Jack Scott

Director, Teacher's Course in Physical Education for Men, 1906-1935

Director of Intramural Athletics

Chair, Department of Physical Education for Men, 1955-1970

1955-1969 Lysle K. Butler
1969-1970 Billy Tidwell

COMBINED DEPARTMENT OF PHYSICAL EDUCATION

Chair, Department of Physical Education, 1970-1989

1970-1971 Billy Tidwell
1971-1972 Julian L. Smith, Acting
1972-1974 Jack Scott
1974-1975 Ruth Brunner
1975-1980 Patrick Penn
1980-1983 Richard Michaels
1983-1986 Don Hunsinger
1986-1988 Lawrence Vance, Acting
1988-1989 Joseph W. Gurtis, Jr., Acting

Director of Men's Athletics, 1974-1989

1974-1975 Tommie Smith
1975-1988 Joseph W. Gurtis, Jr.
1988-1989 Don Hunsinger

Coordinator of Women's Sports, 1974-1980

1974-1977 Claudia Coville
1977-1980 Mary Culhane

Director of Women's Athletics, 1980-

1980-1988 Mary Culhane
1988- Heather Setzler

Director of Physical Education and Athletics, 1989-

1989-1994 James E. Foels
1994-1998 Don Hunsinger
1998- Michael Muska