Earliest Fritz Pollard Football Photo That Has Surfaced To Date

Walter Camp called Pollard "the finest back these eyes have ever seen."

 This rare 1909 photo is the earliest known photo of Professional Football Hall of Famer Fritz Pollard in a football uniform. By comparison, the earliest photo of him as a football player in Pollard's biography by John Carroll is a photo from 1915.  The photo is complete, but for enlargement purposes I have only included the above portion.  The matting is  embossed ”Presented by the Chicago Daily News” and  “Albert G. Lane Technical High School Football Team, 1909”. Second from the left is a young (15, almost 16, year old) Fritz Pollard.

 

 

Lane Technical High School track "contestant" badges, from the Pollard family estate, Rogers Park , Illinois. Worn by Fritz Pollard c. 1910. Each measures about 3 inches square.

 

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The following photograph is the dorm room of Fritz Pollard taken in January, 1920. Pollard returned to college (post Brown) to begin dental studies in Philadelphia while his family resided in new York. Sent by Pollard to his sister Ruth. On the reverse, in very light pencil in Pollard's hand, "Ruth, How do you like this place, Fred". Photo from the Pollard family estate, Rogers Park, Illinois.