exist in the bodies of our fellow earthlings. With Arthrex’s distribution in
150 countries, there is probably nowhere on our planet that Reinhold can
go without bumping into a person who has some type of Arthrex implant in
her body. In this book about the implant revolution, there is one man who
has physically touched the lives of more of his fellow men and women than
any other, and it seems that Reinhold Schmieding is just getting started.
On a chilly, overcast day^4 the last Saturday of November 1888, the Yale
squad is struggling to defeat Princeton to preserve a perfect record. The
Yale Bulldogs football team has arrived at the Polo Grounds in New York
City, having won the previous twelve games by an average of fifty-seven
points, having not allowed a single score all year. The roster includes
William Heffelfinger (who will eventually become the first professional
football player) and Amos Alonzo Stagg, who will go on to become a
legendary coach in multiple sports.
Walter Camp is standing on the sidelines, but he doesn’t know that
history will regard him as the Father of American Football, or that he’s
watching one of the most dominant teams of all time. Like any coach, all
Camp cares about in this moment is the game before him. Football is not
even two decades old, but it is clearly different from the game that
preceded it—rugby. Many of the sport’s early changes are Camp’s,
including the line of scrimmage, the position of quarterback, and the
system of downs.
Determined to achieve a perfect 13–0 season, the game is
uncomfortably close. Although Yale has waltzed through every match this
year, this tilt against Princeton is savagery among gentlemen. In fact, the
Harvard graduates who are officiating the game kick Hector Cowan, the
Princeton captain, out of the game for rough play.^5 They consider it good
fortune to win 10–0, and retreat to New Haven as the mythical national
champions.
Now, put yourself in Walter Camp’s shoes: what if someone had been
seriously injured? Would you rely on a team physician to examine one of
the young seminarians and diagnose a critical injury?
Of course, in 1888 there was no team physician. What many in the
crowd may not have known is that a few years earlier, in 1882, Walter
Camp had been just two classes short of graduating from Yale Medical
School when he dropped out. Camp would later note in a biographical