Get Your PhD In Cal History!

Well, we have had a lot of great posts here on Cal History.  Posts about Big Games (literally!) from the past.  Posts about Cal Spirit.  Posts about many different kinds of sports at Cal.  We wanted to put them in a central location, so it is easy to keep track of them.  If you read through ALL these posts, you should graduate with honors with a PhD in Cal Sports!  Feel free to call yourself a Doctor.  It's all legit.  An internet website says so!   Many thanks to CalBear81 for helping organize the links and write up the quick synopses.  GO BEARS!

Cal Sports

Football:

• The Glorious '98 Big Game - An explanation of how Locomotive Smith, Lol Pringle, Percy Hall and the rest of the intrepid 1898 Golden Bears led Cal to its first Big Game victory, and sent the Berkeley campus into delirium.
• 1899:  An Unforgettable Year! - A review of Cal's first truly great football season, including the best Big Game blow-out of Stanford to date, and ending in Cal playing in what can be considered the first-ever national championship football game.
• Walter Gordon - Cal's Amazing First All-American - The life of one of the most extraordinary people ever to attend Cal -- the Bears' first football All-American in 1918, their first African American player, the first African-American to coach at a predominantly white school, and later, a federal judge and Cal's Alumnus of the Year.  An unbelievable story.
• The House That Andy Built:  The Making Of Memorial Stadium -  The history of football stadiums at Cal, from tiny West Field in 1885, to California Field in 1904, to the planning, financing, and building of California Memorial Stadium in 1923.
• The Day The Bam Broke - Nov 13, 1954 - The incredible day Cal running back Jerry Drew had against Oregon State, rushing for 283 yards on only 11 carries, 25.7 yards a carry!  His rushing total was a Cal record that would last until 2008.
• The 25th Anniversary Of The Play - The discussion of the 1982 Big Game by Joe Kapp and Joe Starkey at a symposium held at Cal in 2007.
• Upsetting Stanford - Cal's Top 10 Big Game Triumphs -  A joyous remembrance of Cal's 10 biggest Big Game upsets of Stanford, from 1902 to 2009, ending with the incredible 1986 win by the 21-point underdog Bears in Joe Kapp's last game as coach. 
• The Sordid Tale Of Ronnie Knox - And you thought cheating in football was a recent phenomenon?  In the 1950s, Ronnie Knox was involved in a variety of scandals at Pac-8 schools. 
• The Miracle At Memorial Oregon 1993  - Down big, Cal comes roaring back against those damnable Webfeet at Memorial Stadium.       

   

      
• Nightmare At Memorial:  UW 1993 - This one wasn't quite as good as the previous game!
• The Year I Rooted For USC - Well, the 70s were a wild and wacky time.  Cal was truly dominant, but needed USC to beat UCLA and, well, I'm sure you can guess the rest.
• Marathon At Memorial:  Arizona 1996 - There are so many overtimes in this Cal-Az matchup, I think it's still going!
• Cal's Greatest Football Coaches:  #8 Mike White, #7 Garrett Cochran, #6 Nibs Price, #5 Bruce Snyder, #4 Stub Allison, #3 Jeff Tedford, #2 Pappy Waldorf, and Andy Smith - A series of stories about the lives and careers of the eight greatest football coaches in Cal history, spanning the period from 1898 to 2011.  Together, they provide a great introduction to the best seasons in Cal history.
  
• 1920 Big Game Program - All the info you could ever want about the 1920 Big Game!
• Son Kai-Kee and George Fong: Cal's Asian American Football Pioneers: The surprising story of two of Cal's early Asian American players, Son Kai-Kee who played fullback on the 1918 varsity squad, and George Fong, who as a stand-out on the 1946 and 1947 teams. 
  

Basketball:

• 100 Harmon Gym - One man's love for a basketball gymnasium, now long gone.
• Following The Legal Saga Of Lou Campanelli (Parts 1, 2, and 3) - After being fired from Cal, former basketball coach Louis Campanelli sued Cal.  Yes!  Sweet litigation.
• Cal-UCLA 1986:  The End Of The Streak - By 1986, UCLA had beaten Cal in 1,240 straight basketball games (all numbers approximate).  With video of the entire game in this post, Kodiak takes us through one of the finest moments in Cal sports history.  
• The World's First Women's College Basketball Team:  The California Golden Bears - The beginning of women's college basketball in Berkeley where, in 1892, Cal fielded the first women's college basketball team ever, and in 1896, the Bears played Stanford in the very first women's intercollegiate basketball game -- all more than a decade before the men started playing the game.

Olympic:

• Cal Crew:  The Oldest And Grandest Of Golden Bear Sports - A history of one the most spectacularly successful Cal sports, which has won 39 Olympic Medals (33 of them Gold), and 19 National Championships, focusing on the three Golden Olympic years of 1928, 1932 and 1948.
• Helen Wills Moody:  Cal's Great Wimbledon Champion - The life of Cal tennis great, Helen Wills Moody, who won 31 Grand Slam titles, 8 Wimbledon singles titles, and two Olympic Gold Medals, among many other accomplishments.
• The First Lady of Tennis: Cal's Hazel Hotchkiss Wightman: The extraordinary life and career of one of the most important athletes who ever graduated from Cal. Hazel Hotchkiss Wightman won 17 Grand Slam titles and two Olympic Gold Medals, essentially invented women's international team tennis, coached and mentored scores of young women players, including numerous future Grand Slam champions, and was a tireless fighter for opportunities for women athletes, from the 1910s through the 1970s.   

Cal Spirit:

• Stanford Jonah:  The Mystery Continues Part I and Part II - Did we steal Stanford Jonah from Georgia Tech?  Did they steal it from us?  And how does the 1929 Rose Bowl get involved in all this?
• Interview With UC Rally Comm Card Stunt Coordinator - Did you know that Cal invented card stunts and has been doing them for over 100 years?  We find out more inside!
• Interview With A UC Cannoneer Part I and Part II - You've heard it explode at Cal games (unless you went solely to Cal games from 1996 to 2001).  Now, learn more!
• Interview with Ken Montgomery - One of the greatest mic mans of all time!  
• The Bear Essentials: 10 Things Every Cal Fan Must Know: A look at the most important Cal football traditions, games, stories, events, athletes, and coaches, which all Cal fans must know about if they want to avoid embarrassing themselves in front of other Cal fans.