Includes bibliographical references (p. 317-343).

The real field -- Pratt -- Fort Marion : first lessons -- Carlisle -- The last fight and first games -- Cheats and swindles -- Not a parlor game -- Dodges and deceptions -- Experiments in flight -- Advances and retreats -- The real all Americans.

Journalist/author Jenkins revives a forgotten piece of history and crafts an inspirational story about a Native American football team that is as much about football as Lance Armstrong's book was about a bike. If you guessed that Yale or Harvard ruled the college gridiron in 1911 and 1912, you'd be wrong. The most popular team belonged to an institution called the Carlisle Indian Industrial School. Its story begins with Lt. Col. Richard Henry Pratt, a fierce abolitionist who believed that Native Americans deserved a place in American society. In 1879, Pratt made a dangerous journey to the Dakota Territory to recruit Carlisle's first students. Years later, three students approached Pratt with the notion of forming a football team. Pratt liked the idea, and in less than twenty years the Carlisle football team was defeating their Ivy League opponents and in the process changing the way the game was played.--From publisher description.