Petaluma sports roots run deep

Editor’s Note: This is the first in a three-part series on the history of Petaluma football submitted by Scott Baker.

If and when you attend a Petaluma or Casa Grande high school football game this season (and we really hope you do as it boosts school spirit and raises most of the money for all school sports), remember that you are witnessing a sports tradition that goes back to at least 1892, according to the book “Sports Memories of Sonoma County” by local author Lee Torliatt.

Petaluma High School was built in 1873, not long after the end of the Civil War. In the early days, there was an intense rivalry between Union-sympathizing Petaluma and Rebel-tilting Santa Rosa, which seems to have carried over to the playing fields.

It appears that high school football in Petaluma dates back to at least late 1892 (when football resembled rugby). When the Santa Rosa team asked for a postponement for a scheduled Dec. 31 game in 1892, the Petaluma newspaper reported, “Santa Rosa High School is not at all prepared to cope with Petaluma High School Football.”

Early mascot suggestions were “a rooster, a cross-eyed pig, and a yellow dog” (could this have been the origins of the “World’s Ugliest Dog” contest?). By the end of 1893, the Petaluma team had three wins over Santa Rosa, making one writer ask whether it was “the richness of our milk, the pureness of our homemade flour, or the strength of the Petaluma cheese” that made our athletes superior.

Football was played sporadically through the early 1900s, often on Thanksgiving or as a winter festivity. At some point, it waned due to the many injuries suffered and the difficulties of fielding an 11-man team.

It should be noted that President Theodore Roosevelt was part of a movement in 1906 to reduce football injuries by instituting the forward pass, increasing the first down length, outlawing mass formations and other innovations, greatly reducing injuries.

After World War I, local football came back strong, thanks to great football athletes led by Santa Rosa’s Ernie Nevers and Petaluma’s Biff Hoffman. They became nationally known after Nevers and Hoffman became stars at Stanford.

Nevers is the namesake of “Ernie Nevers Field” at Santa Rosa High School. A Stanford All American (1924-25), and the man Pop Warner called, “The football player without a fault.” He played in the early NFL, and also Major League baseball, and still holds the NFL record for points scored in an NFL game at 40. He was one of the first inductees into the NFL Hall of Fame, and was a Marine and war hero during World War II.

Biff Hoffman was the star of the Stanford Rose Bowl team of 1927 that tied in the Rose Bowl, 7-7 and tied for National Championship, and team of 1928 that won the Rose Bowl, 7-6. He was also an outstanding track athlete for Stanford in the discus. He married the daughter of Bank of America founder A.P. Giannini.

This season, Petaluma High School and Santa Rosa High School will not play in the “Club Game,” which ends a series of several years. The rivalry was resumed after the Sonoma County League and the North Bay League were reorganized in the ’90s.

The “Club,” currently in possession of Petaluma High after last year’s victory,is a trophy similar to the Cal-Stanford big game Axe, and symbolizes the history of the 120-year-old rivalry. Casa Grande High will play Santa Rosa High in football this year, and perhaps the ghosts of Nevers and Hoffman will be in attendance.