PROLOGUE:
THE SOCCER WAR
History simply doesn’t teach that soccer was nearly a mainstream sport in America. Soccer was growing in popularity late in the 1800s then again in the early 1900s, with unquestionable gains in momentum into the 1920s. It was on track to be relevant, maybe even a topflight draw. Then, the Soccer War killed it.
(Photo: Bethlehem Steel center halfback/inside right Andrew Rankin. Photo: soccer Pictorial Weekly, September 23, 1927)
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PROLOGUE
THE SOCCER WAR
In the simplest depiction of this event, it was like anything else: a struggle over power and money taking place between 1927 and 1929 but starting much, much earlier. The American Soccer League, or ASL, was the most popular top flight game in town. The league made money, had ambitious owners and recruited top foreign players. That was a problem and got the US into hot water with FIFA… who had been established in 1904 to govern the global game. The US had some international success, and wanted to stay on the map. The United States Football Association, or USFA, negotiated with FIFA, agreed to punish the ASL… and the Soccer War was on. Two years, basically, of in-fighting played out, culminating in lost revenue, confusion, and ultimately a settlement that concluded… two weeks before the stock market crash in October of 1929.
America was left without a clear soccer identity or any money to fund a rehabbed image. It was from that moment, that I believe we’ve been trying to rebuild soccer in America. Read more about The Soccer War here, and check out our additional references below. (Photo: Wall Street Crash of 1929; Photo: SSA / Wikimedia Commons / Public domain)
Our GUEST
Journalist and writer, Roger Allaway is one of the preeminent historians of soccer in North America. Born in New York City in 1945, Allaway graduated from Ohio Wesleyan University and worked in newspapers for over 30 years, including stints in Detroit, Toledo, and Philadelphia. From 2007, he was an historian at the National Soccer Hall of Fame. He is past president of the Society for American Soccer History. Allaway is author or co-author of numerous articles and books, including The Encyclopedia of American Soccer History (2001); The United States Tackles the World Cup (2002, updated 2011); Rangers, Rovers and Spindles (2005), and Corner Offices and Corner Kicks (2009). You can find his books on Amazon.
ADDITIONAL RESOURCES
To learn more about The Soccer War and the history of soccer in America that preceded it, we recommend the following resources.
Books
- Soccer in a Football World: The Story of America’s Forgotten Game by David Wangerin
- The Encyclopedia of American Soccer by Roger Allaway and Colin Jose
Articles
- The Archives Room: What was the Soccer War? by Roger Allaway
- The Secret History of American Soccer by Brian Phillips
General
Our PERSPECTIVE
The Soccer War is an important and untaught event in the history of American sports. Soccer’s climb to popularity in the late 1800s and early 1900s is often unmentioned. The sporting public does not realize soccer has a rich history in this country, only to be undone by infighting and bad timing. Before we can understand the moments that have contributed to soccer’s rising popularity in America, it’s important to understand that it was once, almost, a mainstream sport.
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