The Tournament of Roses Parade is a beloved tradition that dates back to 1890 4
ROSE BOWL HISTORY THE BIRTH OF BOWL GAMES F ans call it the Granddaddy of Them All The Rose Bowl is the oldest bowl game in college football It is played every year in Pasadena California The first Rose Bowl game was played on January 1 1902 starting the tradition of bowl games on New Year’s Day Michigan beat Stanford 49 0 in a game that proved to be too lopsided for its own good But the Rose Parade came before the Rose Bowl game The Pasadena Valley Hunt Club founded the parade in 1890 to bring visitors from colder climates to California Tourists from the Midwest and Northeast United States came to Pasadena to enjoy the warmer weather in the winter The club’s members decorated horse buggies with flowers for the parade 1 5
But it was more than just a parade in 1890 The festivities included games such as tug-of-war jousting and foot races A few years later the Rose Parade grew bigger It added parade floats with motors There were also ostrich races and a race between a camel and an elephant In 1900 the Rose Parade was shown in movie theaters throughout the country Once people from other states saw film of the parade many wanted to travel to California to see it in person By 1902 the Tournament of Roses Association was ready to add the emerging sport of football to the festival to attract even more visitors It wanted to include one team from the West Coast and an opponent from east of the Mississippi River The University of Southern California USC was the closest college football team to Pasadena but USC did not play an impressive schedule It played only one game against a college team in 1901 a 6 0 loss to Pomona College The University of California Berkeley was also close to Pasadena but only two of its nine wins were against college teams The association eventually chose Stanford as the team from West Coast Michigan was its opponent The first Rose Bowl game was held at the Pasadena town square which is now called Tournament Park In 1922 6
Aerial view of the Rose Bowl Stadium in 1931 a new stadium was built for the football games It seated 57,000 fans and cost more than 270,000 to build The players and coaches from Michigan and Stanford traveled to Pasadena by train for the first game in 1902 It took them almost a week on the train to get to Pasadena Michigan had won all 10 of its games before the Rose Bowl and was expected to handle Stanford easily Michigan had not given up a single point and had scored 7
