During the formative years of the NFL, the league had a team made up entirely of American Indians. The team was not very good, in spite of such great players as Jim Thorpe, Joe Guyon and Pete Calac. Thorpe was past his prime, and the team had more than its share of distractions. Made up primarily of former Carlisle players, the Oorang Indians served as excuse for old friends, who enjoyed each others company, to get together and play some football. They lasted only two years 1922 and 1923, with a record of 3 - 16. The Oorang Indians played two of their games in nearby Marion, Ohio, and the rest on the road. They were to a great extent a traveling road show.

The team was owned by Walter Lingo of Larue, Ohio. Lingo was the owner of Oorang Kennels, the nations largest mail-order puppy business, and used the team to promote a breed of Airedale Terrier that he had developed. Before the games, and during half-time they featured dog shows, drums and dancing. The shows included World War I reenactments that showed how the Oorang Airedales had performed in the war. Many of the players and the dogs were veterans. One player, Nikolas Lassa, nicknamed ‘Long-Time Sleep’ by his teammates would even wrestled a bear.

In addition to the great play of the Carlisle teams, the Indians also became well know for their sportsmanship and sense of humor.

One year Pennsylvania had a player on their roster named A. E. Bull. During the course of the game A. E. Bull was knocked on his rear end. One of the Carlisle players pointed to him and said: “Look Sitting Bull.”

Once Carlisle’s Pete Hauser had to be helped off of the field after being intentionally kneed by an opposing player. He asked the player: “Who the savage now?”

In 1908, in a game against Syracuse Pop Warner was back to his old ways with a new trick. In 1903 he had used the Hidden Ball Play to make the ball disappear. This time, to disguise the ball carrier, he tried to make it look as if several players had the ball. The Indian players wore jerseys with leather patches shaped like footballs sewn to them. Carlisle players would clutch their stomachs pretending to have the ball .

Harvard had scouts at the game. They had been the victims of the Hidden Ball Play and were determined not to be fooled again. The following week Carlisle met a Harvard team that had a trick of its own. When it was time to pick a game ball the Crimson coach presented ‘Pop’ Warner with a basket of balls to choose from. The balls had been dyed crimson to matched the jersey color of the Harvard team. After a short argument the coaches agreed, they would use a regular colored ball, and the Carlisle would remove the patches.

Like most of the students who went to Carlisle, Jim Thorpe participated in the summer Outing Program. Students worked on nearby farms as hired hands. They got on the job experience and earned wages as they mingled with white society. The students earned money but they did not have access to their own funds without the written permission of the Indian agent for their tribe.

When Jim Thorpe became a member of the Olympic team in 1912, he requested $100 of his own money for expenses on his once on a lifetime trip to Stockholm, Sweden. The agent for the Sac and Fox Tribe turned down Thorpe’s request. The agent stated that in his opinion he could not recommend letting him have the money because “ ...He has now reached the age, when, instead of gallivanting around the country, he should be at work ...”
When Jim Thorpe won Olympic glory for his nation, and established himself as the worlds greatest athlete, he had to do it on the cheap.

When the the forward pass was new, many of the rules for its use had not been refined. In a game between the Carlisle Indians and the Chicago Maroons, both sides used tactics that by today's rules would be considered illegal. Chicago was able to neutralize much of Carlisle’s potent passing attack by hitting the receivers before the ball arrived. Carlisle’s great end Albert Exindine found a way around that problem.

Exindine noticed that the Chicago scrubs were standing close to the field. He told Pete Hauser to hold the ball as long as possible and wait for him to come open. Exindine let two Chicago defenders knock him out of bounds. As he stumbled he circled the bench and started running again back onto the field. Hauser made a 40 yard pass and hit Exindine all alone at the goal line. The Chicago players and coaches were outraged, but the pass was so beautiful that many of the local fans cheered for the Indians.

1896
Carlisle vs.
the Big Four