It was November 6th, 1869, and the Rutgers were competing against Princeton in New Brunswick, New Jersey, in American football; the final score tallied up to being 6-4, and the Rutgers had won the first ever American football game. On April 7th, 1959, Walter Chauncey Camp was born, otherwise known as the “Father of American Football.” He originally was a rugby player but decided to alter the rules to create a more modern version, which then became American football, the most popular sport in America. Not only did he create the sport, he also played as a halfback and coached the Yale football team between the years of 1888 and 1892.

American football is a sport with many different leagues, the most known league being the National Football League (NFL). It originally started out as two different leagues, the NFL and the AFL (American Football League). It was founded in 1920 and contained 14 different teams. Five teams were from Ohio, four teams from Illinois, two teams from Indiana and New York and one team from Michigan. Through a lot of instability and competition from rival leagues, the NFL managed to become the strongest American professional football league. In 1970, the NFL finally merged with its biggest rival, the AFL, and created two conferences, the American Football Conference (AFC) and the National Football Conference (NFC).

Football rules have changed over the years. An example being, the touchdowns only counted for five points before 1912, and field goals counted for four points before 1909. Field layout also caused the goal posts to be on the goal line, which later changed to the end line in 1974. Before this change, football players could possibly run into a metallic pole while running a route. Plays such as the two point play also didn’t exist before 1994. Without the two point play, teams that were down eight points would have to rely on luck to get the ball back to win rather than tying the game. These changes to the rules make the leagues much more fair.

On March 14th, 1925, Walter Camp unfortunately died. Even though he died, his greatest achievement, American football, still lives on. For around 153 years, American football has existed, and within those years, so much has changed into the football that we know today.