1926 Michigan football newsreel

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Football Newsreels - 1926

Michigan football fans who couldn't make it to Ann Arbor for a game could catch a glimpse of the Wolverines in newsreels shown at their neighborhood movie theater. REO-GRAMS produced by the R. E. Olds company were just one of many newsreel brands produced by Pathe, Movietone, or newspaper owned film companies that brought the news of the world to movie houses around Michigan.

1926 Michigan Football Newsreel

This newsreel opens with the Michigan players coming out of the locker room in Yost Field House, headed for the practice field. Fielding Yost is shown instructing Benny Friedman in the art of placekicking, the famous "Benny to Bennie" combination (Friedman to Oosterbaan) and a number of other star players are introduced, followed by a short clip from the 1926 Ohio State game.

The newsreel continies with 1926 captain and All-American quarterback Benny Friedman accepting the trophy symbolic of a second straight first place finish in the Big Ten. Michigan's 5-0 conference record was matched by Northwestern, but University of Illinois professor Fred Dickinson devised a complicated rating system to award the title to Michigan "on points." For a time, Dickinson's formula was also used to award a national championship trophy. Yost regarded the 1926 team, his last and the last to play at Ferry Field, as one of the best he ever coached.