Figure 1.--Rugby was created in England and as the name implies at a public (private secondary) school and became the preminent public school sport. Here boys at Eton, nother public school, are playing rugby in 1980. |
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Rugby was the preminent public (private seconfary) school sport. It is played at almost all public schools. We note Eton boys playing Rugby in 1980. These boys are aged about 16. The boys wear long-sleeved rugby shirts, shorts, and knee socks. The shorts are cut short, the style of rugby uniforms in the 1970s and 1980s. The boys also have kneesocks with turn-over cuffs and are usually worn with garters to hold them in place. Note that a couple of the boys have apparently lost or dispensed with the garters so that their socks fall down around their ankles. Most of the socks are a plain color, but one boy wears striped socks. Rugby is played with no padding, not even shin
guards, so it is considered quite a rough contact sport. Rugby boys like to wear tee shirts with the slogan, "Give Blood, Play Rugby."
Eton College (along with Harrow, Winchester, and a few others) is among the
most elite "public schools" in England, now patronized by royalty and
the sons of the nobility. "Public" schools are of course private in the sense
that the parents pay tuition and are very difficult to get into. Parents
often put their sons down for entrance a few days after they are born. The
school is only for boys. Most of the boys enter at about age 13 and graduate
at 18. Both Prince William and Prince Harry graduated from Eton. On campus,
the older boys wear tail coats and top hats. The so-called Eton collar is
named for the starched white collars that the younger boys traditionally
wore. Eton was founded in the late Middle Ages by Henry VI, the same king who
built King's College at Cambridge University.
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