Tin Horns and Blue Shoes: Seattle Prepared to Outshout Portland
In 1893, the Seattle Athletic Club drilled at Madison Street Park and stockpiled noisemakers for a Thanksgiving-week football match against the Multnomahs, with 3,000 fans expected.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
SEATTLE AND PORTLAND TEAMS TRAIN FOR THE GREAT FOOTBALL GAME.
The Seattle Athletic Club football team practiced at Madison Street Park yesterday afternoon, and the players were put through a steady drill. The first eleven will not line up against a rival eleven until this afternoon.
The championship depends on the result of the game, and both clubs are training every nerve to improve their teams before it comes off.
Some of the rooms of the S.A.C. clubhouse are beginning to assume the appearance of bargain counters. A big supply of blue and white shoes, tin horns and all sorts of instruments to be used for making a tremendous noise has been laid in, and these are being parcelled out to club members. There will be a good-sized regiment of “rooters” in line, who have announced their intention to outdo all previous demonstrations made by their own club or the Multnomahs.
It is likely that there will be two changes from the rush line that played at Portland. Church, who has fully recovered from a hurt received in the Tacoma game, will resume his position at guard. Quinby will not be able to play on account of business duties, and his place at tackle will be filled by Baxter.
It is expected that an attendance of fully 3,000 will celebrate the meeting of the Multnomah and Seattle clubs’ football teams at Madison Street Park next Saturday.
“There will be a good-sized regiment of “rooters” in line, who have announced their intention to outdo all previous demonstrations made by their own club or the Multnomahs.”
Seattle and Portland were rival young cities in 1893, and a football game became a proxy for civic bragging rights. Today’s Sounders-Timbers and Seahawks-49ers matchups still carry a version of that same Northwest need to prove which city matters more.
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