re: SEC Trivia - Which 4 teams played the 1943 Season?

I mean... you can keep looking like an idiot on your own, or I can help you... your pick...

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Each fall Jason Hasty, the Hargrett Library’s UGA athletics history specialist, curates an exhibit that explores the University of Georgia’s athletics program. “Fighting Spirit” uses photographs, textiles, and other historic material drawn from the UGA Athletic Association collection to tell the story of Wally Butts, the coach who built a program and guided it to the pinnacle of success only to see his team dismantled by the needs of war.

“The story of Georgia’s first trip to the Rose Bowl in 1943 is well-known,” said Hasty, “but what’s talked about less often is that this championship team ceased to exist as soon as that game ended. When many of his best players enlisted or were drafted into service, Coach Butts had to guide the program through the war years and then rebuild the team with returning GIs.”

The story of Walter Ruark, co-captain for the 1942 season, gives voice to the many players who gave their all on the football field and the battlefield. “Ruark was a phenomenal player on that team, but then he entered the service and never made it back home,” said Hasty. Walter Ruark’s Rose Bowl uniform, on loan from his daughter, Pat Fleming of Clarkesville, will serve as a centerpiece in the exhibit.

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UGA’s policy on students departing their studies for World War II was: “Any student who left for service would be permitted to resume his education after the war ‘as nearly as possible at the point where it was interrupted’” (Dyer, 243-244).

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The U.S. Navy built several new buildings on campus (Dyer, 243) and operated a Pre-Flight School at the University of Georgia Campus. As one of only five such schools in the nation, the program trained approximately 20,000 cadets in the skills needed as combat pilots in the Pacific Theater. The Navy utilized most of the existing campus and built numerous buildings and athletic facilities used by the college in later years.

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Just because we fielded a team doesn't mean we didn't send our students to fight... If you can't read, I suppose that's a you problem.

Whew that butt be hurting.

Let's see...

2018 Most patriotic states: LINK

Only SEC states in the top HALF of the country... in order
4) South Carolina
10) Georgia
20) Mississippi
25) Missouri

Military factor only:
3) South Carolina
4) Georgia
10) Alabama
12) Texas
15) Mississippi
18) Florida
22) Missouri
24) Arkansas

Soo... Florida and Tennessee in here acting like they are these hugely patriotic states, but... Missouri is ahead of Tennessee in both areas and Florida barely surpasses them in military engagement only.


But but but... historically we were so much more patriotic...

While we're at it, let's see how the SEC states contributed to WW2...

If we work backwards from total deaths and the % dead from the below figures:

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FloridaWorld War II: 4,609 deaths
Deaths per man 15-44: 1.00%

GeorgiaWorld War II: 6,736 deaths
Deaths per man 15-44: .91%

AlabamaWorld War II: 6,166 deaths
Deaths per man 15-44: .94%

ArkansasWorld War II: 4,601 deaths
Deaths per man 15-44: 1.02%

KentuckyWorld War II: 7,900 deaths
Deaths per man 15-44: 1.20%

LouisianaWorld War II: 4,987 deaths
Deaths per man 15-44: .87%

MississippiWorld War II: 4,162 deaths
Deaths per man 15-44: .83%

MissouriWorld War II: 9,817 deaths
Deaths per man 15-44: 1.14%

South CarolinaWorld War II: 4,129 deaths
Deaths per man 15-44: .93%

TennesseeWorld War II: 7,710 deaths
Deaths per man 15-44: 1.13%

TexasWorld War II: 18,793 deaths
Deaths per man 15-44: 1.19%

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We get a stacked ranking of the following in terms of soldiers sent into WWII

Texas 1,579,244
Missouri 861,140
Georgia 740,220
Tennessee 682,301
Kentucky 658,333
Alabama 655,957
Louisiana 573,218
Missisippi 501,446
Florida 460,900
Arkansas 451,078
South Carolina 443,978

So congrats on all that patriotism...

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South Carolina I know played in 43.

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Yep, but were not part of the SEC at the time.

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Georgia and LSU played with freshmen (too young for the draft)

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18 is too young for the draft?

Nearly every Georgia male athlete was also in the ROTC program, and many went to the military. Those that graduated went as officers or senior enlisted men.

Can you imagine getting into a war so big today that they cancelled most of the SEC season because all young men of college age were expected to join the military? It would be surreal.

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Because they hate America and have been caught in their America-hating ways.

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This. LSU is famous for not supporting US war efforts, unless they're confederate.

Are you seriously questioning LSUs military ties and patriotism? Wtf are you guys like 12?

The name “fighting Tigers” is from a notorious and feared brigade of soldiers in the civil war. General Sherman was LSUs chancellor. The volunteer group of airman the “flying tigers” also named for LSU under command of LSU grad. The landing craft for D Day invasion built in New Orleans by LSU guys. No SEC school other than A&M is known for its military associations.

And also congrat's on that 1942 national championship.

On most of the college campuses across the nation, the physically able athletes had already signed up to fight for their country in the weeks immediately after Pearl Harbor. Florida had gone 4-6 in 1941 but expectations were high that 1942 would be different thanks to season-closing wins over Miami and Georgia Tech and a close loss to UCLA. Those hopes and dreams went out the window with the unilateral declaration of war against Germany and Japan.

The most able bodied of Coach Thomas Lieb’s football team were already in the military when the 1942 season arrived. Most of Florida’s team was made up of young guys waiting their eighteenth birthdays or who couldn’t pass the physical.

That wasn’t the case at Georgia, which had one of the two or three best ROTC programs in the country. Georgia was already loaded when the war broke out. By the time the 1942 season began, Coach Wally Butts had a roster full of stars who were enrolled in the ROTC program, including All-Americans like Flatfoot Frankie Sinkwich (he won the Heisman that year), George Poschner and Charlie Trippi, who would go on to become one of the greatest college football players in history.

When Georgia and Florida squared off in Jacksonville on November 7, the game was over by the first quarter and by halftime, it was total carnage. Butts could have called it off any time he wanted, but he kept pouring it on. Late in the fourth quarter Sinkwich and Trippi were still in the game pouring it on.
The final score was 75-0. Georgia went on to win a national championship. Florida went 3-7 with wins over Randolph-Macon, Auburn and Villanova.