Little Brother tried to copy the winged helmet
While researching the history of UM Football uniforms I found this little nugget:
http://bentley.umich.edu/athdept/football/helmet/mhelmet.htm
Copying big brother's winged helmet is just plain pathetic.
you cannot read. The article states "Michigan State had adopted its version of a "winged helmet" several years earlier." So I guess Michigan copied MSU. Whatever, Michigan is historically better so Spartans do not care, we will stick to the Spartan on the side of the helmet.
I recall it was an 'S' before the coaching change.
Sorry if I'm wrong.
Lots of teams wore winged helmets back then. As noted in the article you linked, the "wings" were part of the pattern of the Spaulding helmet. Crisler's innovation was not the wings (as is commonly thought) but the three stripes, which he added to make WRs more visible downfield to their QBs (this was back when everyone wore dark uniforms).
Shhh, don't let facts get in the way of TRADITION.
guy thinks he is on to something. I think Notre Dame stole their nickname from an island in England?
Spartyon19962001, you are such a tool. That guy is just stating what he thought. I don't feel that your comments added anything worth while.
I am just reading an article correctly and commenting to a false claim. You just joined, is this bouje? You have a new nickname. Why? You have enough points to survive for a couple more weeks.
August 9th, 2009 at 10:05 PM ^
I did just join. I don't even know much about the points. I am always on this site though and just get tired of some of the rude people. Especially a MSUcks fan!
August 10th, 2009 at 12:36 AM ^
Please don't make posts that use a "clever" variation on a team's name. Despite what the commenters over at the freep think, MSUcks, O$U, scUM, or any similar nickname of them are not, in fact, clever. Even if you were joking, which you may have been, using nicknames like that will make you enemies in a hurry.
August 10th, 2009 at 3:57 AM ^
You are on a thread entitled "Little Brother tried to copy the winged helmet"...what do you expect? Also, why not express you're sentiments to the OP as well if you feel so strongly about it? Not trying to be a dick or nothing, just sayin.
August 10th, 2009 at 12:01 PM ^
...check out #1 on this list. By contrast, Brian has sold "Bow Down Little Brother" shirts.
August 9th, 2009 at 10:55 PM ^
anyone guess why??
And it's not "the winged helmet" that is famous. Other teams wear a winged helmet also. It is "Michigan's winged helmet" that is famous. There is a difference, and understanding that difference is understanding a lot about Michigan football. If we we did not accompany that helmet with a powerhouse program, with Heisman winners, and multiple national championships, our winged helmet would be about as special as Delaware's. While the helmet is cool-looking, and is the most recognizable of helmets, what it represents matters just as much.
I'm not positive, but I think we are the only I-A school that uses the design (Princeton and Delaware are I-AA). We can sum it up this way: we weren't the first to use the design, but we embraced it while everyone else of note dropped it, so we can rightfully call it ours now.
Kudos to whomever it was in the athletic department who decided to keep painting the design on the helmets even when we switched from leather to plastic ones.
The bottom line is that Fritz Crisler designed the winged helmet while at Princeton, the Spaulding Sporting Goods Company used that design as a model for a line of helmets they produced and offered for sale to any team that didn't want the plain brown helmet of the day.
Michigan State was one of those schools who ordered the Spaulding model and used it for a few years before abandoning it. (however the idea that MSU "copied it" from anyone is ridiculous, they were just a loyal Spaulding customer.
In the meantime, Crisler left Princeton and brought his winged design to Michigan. (Princeton has since returned to Crisler's winged helmet, which if I say so myself, looks pretty sweet in orange and black).
Every night I cry myself to sleep wishing the gentlemen of the 1930s Michigan State teams had thought of the winged helmets first. I consider this to be a very significant loss, especially for the upcoming season.
August 9th, 2009 at 10:03 PM ^
needs to end...
August 9th, 2009 at 11:38 PM ^
Why, it's funny.
August 9th, 2009 at 11:41 PM ^
Not really, kind of played out.
August 9th, 2009 at 10:23 PM ^
I agree,I wouldn't consider sparty as any part of the family.I would say more like the annoying little assclown from down the street.
August 9th, 2009 at 10:40 PM ^
Crisler designed the winged football helmet at Princeton for a number of reasons. First, Crisler wanted his quarterbacks to be able to spot receivers more easily down field, and the football records for the Tigers in the 1930s bear this out (it is even more interesting to look at how the passing numbers fell off dramatically when Princeton went back to a plain helmet design). Second, the three vertical stripes on the helmet match the three stripes on the sleeves of the 1934 Princeton uniform. Third, the wing is meant to symbolize tigers ears flared back.
August 10th, 2009 at 12:36 AM ^
Actually, in the 1930's Michigan State was still Michigan Agricultural College. Just fyi.
August 10th, 2009 at 3:45 PM ^
No, they became Michigan State College in 1925. You can still see the "MSC" abbreviation on a couple of old buildings there. (They became MSU in 1955.)
August 10th, 2009 at 1:59 AM ^
As the linked article states, Spaulding's particular leather helment used the wing shaped leather piece to reinforce the front and attach it to the crown. Anybody who wore this Spaulding helmet had a "winged" helmet. Many colored the segments differently like Crisler (I don't know if he was the first). This link has many of the helmets of the time showing UCLA, Kansas and LSU with "colored" winged helmets.
http://www.pasttimesports.biz/football.html
Game photos are available that show the players of Michigan Ag playing UM--the Aggies wearing winged helmets and the Wolverines wearing the black helmets they wore before Crisler.
As a previous poster notes, its not that UM was first but that we stayed with the winged design after plastic helmets made wings obsolete. Because we continued this design, we have the best, most distinctive helmets in football.
August 10th, 2009 at 10:23 AM ^
wasting my time.