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© Tim Peeler, 2025
Imagine if North Carolina-born comedian Andy Griffith had been British. The accent would still be distinct, though vastly different. The confusion was practically the same. The conclusion was a little different.
What it was, was football.
Specifically, college football in Chapel Hill.
In Griffith’s case, it was the comedy routine that made him famous, a country bumpkin’s experience of wandering into a college football stadium (almost certainly UNC-Chapel Hill’s Kenan Stadium) and seeing two groups of men squaring off in between to large banks of people, monitored closely by seven or eight convicts. He recorded the routine in 1953 and it has been played innumerable times in the three quarters of a century that followed.
That routine was predated, however, by a handful of Brits and Irishmen going to the exact same venue to see something that confused them just as much as the game Griffith saw.
“I simply don’t understand what is going on,” wrote Henry Longhurst, a reporter for the London Sunday Times. “All I know is that I am doing OK as long as I holler ‘To Hell with Tennessee.’”
Three English journalists, three Scottish writers, a couple of Irish writers and nine of the 10 members of the British Ryder Cup team found themselves sitting in the press box of Kenan Stadium on a specially scheduled day off from the ninth-annual battle between U.S. and British golfers, which turned the biennial two-day competition into perhaps the greatest three-day weekend of sports anyone in the state at that time could remember. (This year's Ryder Cup will be held at Bethpage Black in New York.)
When the Pinehurst Resort owner Richard Tufts offered up Pinehurst Resort's No. 2 course to the PGA of America to host the Cup competition—fending off an effort to postpone the event to the next spring to accommodate the busy schedule of the British team—it was with the idea of having two great events over two consecutive weekends, the Ryder Cup and the North and South Open, the professional tournament that had been played for 49 years at No. 2, Donald Ross's masterpiece in the Sandhills. While there was money on the line—a total purse of $7,500 and free room and board during the week of the tournament—the North and South was not officially sanctioned by the PGA.
For $12.50, fans could attend all days of both events.
To amplify the spectacle even more, the PGA organizers agreed to take the two Saturdays of the events so that visiting golfers and writers from around the world could see American college football. The first weekend, North Carolina’s football team host top-ranked Tennessee in Chapel Hill, about 60 miles north of Pinehurst; the second weekend Duke hosted Wake Forest in Durham. It was typical for the North and South to take the day off so it would not conflict with college football in the state.
Chuck Erickson, North Carolina’s assistant athletics director and varsity golf coach at the time, came up with the idea of inviting the international golf community to the Carolina-Tennessee game and sent a letter of invitation all parties involved.
“There will be no activity at Pinehurst on Nov. 3 and Nov. 10, since football games are scheduled in this area on the two Saturdays and Pinehurst knows better than to attempt to buck a football day in this State,” wrote Durham Sun sports editor Hugo Germino. “As a matter of fact, the British first protested the proposal to have the matches played Friday and Sunday, skipping over Saturday.
“When the Englishmen were told that the North Carolina and Tennessee would play a football game on that day, they gave in—and gracefully accepted invitations to be special guests of the University of North Carolina at the game in Chapel Hill.”
There was a large reception before the game for the golfers
and the press (all of 30 American and six British journalists) before the game at an alumni building adjacent to the football
stadium. Only three of the American players, who were quite familiar with
football, bothered to attend, with most of them taking the opportunity to go elsewhere
for paid exhibitions.
U.S. captain Sam Snead drove from Pinehurst to Florence, South
Carolina, for an exhibition, earning him the nickname in local papers of “Scrammin’
Sammy. North Carolina natives Clayton Heafner of Charlotte and Skip Alexander of Lexington went to the game. Alexander, less than a year after being the lone survivor of a military airplane crash, was the sentimental hero of the weekend.
While some of the British golfers were familiar with the sport of American football, the foreign press pool was not. Not even halftime tea—a seemingly perfect intermission snack in Chapel Hill—made them feel more comfortable.
Here are the thoughts of Britain’s most acclaimed sportswriter of the day, Desmond Hackett of the London Daily Express, as he watched along with 42,000 spectators as the Volunteers rolled up a 27-0 victory over the Tar Heels en route to its first ever national championship.
“They tried to tell me that this was a tough-guy game, a piece of legalized mayhem that made bullfighting look sissy. No sir. Any professional rugby club in England could eliminate the heavily armored characters who ambled in and out of this game.
“The England men do not need the insurance policy of crash helmets and more padding than a horsehair couch. They wear extremely brief shorts and cotton shirts and in this rig I feel sure they could beat the long pants off these American huskies. That is merely my opinion, an opinion which I freely express because I shall be able to duck out of town.
“Back in England, the men of rugby football play forty minutes each way with one 10-minute interval. They would gulp at the idea of bringing in substitutes or that amazing all-change system when a team breaks off the defense shore and moves on the attack.
“We love your beautiful North Carolina girls who so sweetly led the organized cheering. We feel sure they mean well but most of their best efforts appeared to inspire brisker action from the opposition members.
“The England crowd do not need any of this artificial stimulant, they up and roar their heads off when they feel so inclined. And this goes for the carriage trade in the grandstands. A polite hand clap was the nearest thing to a bust of enthusiasm that the upper set could arouse.
“There seemed to be considerable respect for the extensive panel of referees and the supporting cast of the chain gang who appeared to be taking constant ground survey in the middle of the affair. The English crowd stand up for their right to question the verdict of the referee. They are not slow to state their willingness to buy him glasses on account of his short-sightedness, or to suggest that he could not move so well because of the money tucked into his boots by the rival managers.
“But this American way of football is gay and colorful and I suppose a great game if you can guess what is going on. It is way ahead of England in its setting. This dignified arena in the glade of the deep green pines is among the finest sporting prints I have ever seen. So thanks for a wonderful memory.”
The parties all returned to Pinehurst after the game and, the next day, watched the Americans finish off a 9 ½ to 2 ½ victory against the overmatched Brits. Tennessee went on to win a disputed national title, despite following a perfect regular season with a loss to Southern Conference member Maryland in the Sugar Bowl. Coach Carl Snavely's Tar Heels finished a limp 2-8.
And no one stepped in anything.
