100 candles on Linfield Football birthday cake in 2014

Originally posted Oct. 24, 2013 

Mark your calendar. Get ready to put 100 candles on the Linfield Football birthday cake.

The 2014 season will be Linfield football's 100th.

Linfield, then McMinnville College, started playing the sport in 1896. First game ever for the Wildcats was a 54-0 loss to Pacific College (now called George Fox University.)

Coach of the Linfield teams for its first five seasons (1896-1900) was A. M. Brumback. If his name seems familiar, it's because there's a Brumback Street (see photo) on campus near Linfield Football's Maxwell Field. However, the street honors not his football, gymnastics or track & field coaching at Linfield. It's because he was the college's president, 1903-05.

Some information about Brumback calls him "Arthur Brumback" or "Arthur M. Brumback." For the record, his full name was Arthur Marion Brumback.

Linfield did not play football 1906-1921 because the college Board of Trustees deemed football too violent. The sport was dropped in the summer of 1906 and not resumed until the 1922 season.

The first 10 seasons (1896-1905) of Wildcat football were as McMinnville College. All Wildcat football since 1922, the year the college changed its name, has been as Linfield.

Due to World War II, no football was played 1943-1945.

To clarify, the 100th anniversary of starting Linfield football was in 1996. But, the 2014 season will be the 100th season of the Wildcats playing football.
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Thanks to Linfielder Dennis Anderson for alerting Wildcatville of impending Linfield Football 2014 milestone.