No Game for Boys to Play

“A thoroughly written account of the facets of football concerns, benefits, politics, and the game’s rise to the forefront of the sports industry. . . . [The book is a] necessary cross between public health and sport history that highlights the continued concern for football athletes.”—Journal of Sport History

“Groundbreaking, badly needed history. With so much ink spilled on college and professional football, there are surprisingly few publications on the history of youth football, and this is by far the best.”—Journal of American History

“A thought-provoking monograph that should hold out interest to anyone concerned about the health of children and the educational value of adult-directed youth sport programs.”—Journal of the History of Childhood and Youth

“Excellent . . . Bachynski explores the long history of debates about the dangers of football and sheds light on current crises around the sport, concussions, and chronic traumatic encephalopathy, or CTE. . . . [and] does a wonderful job of examining youth football as a self-reinforcing institution primarily created, re-created, and supported by adults.”—Journal of the History of Medicine and Allied Sciences

“A comprehensive study of the postwar rise of youth football.”—New York Review of Books

“Important and timely . . . [Bachynski] traces the evolution of social, cultural, and medical attitudes toward football, and how notions of masculinity, national identity, and boyhood historically have shaped debates on player safety. . . . The result is an accessible study . . . with great appeal for those with an interest in public health, sociology of sport, or men’s studies. Highly recommended.”—CHOICE

“The way in which Bachynski describes the cultural and communal construction of safety, personal responsibility, and masculinity does much to explain the way we value particular forms of masculine identity in American society. Smart, salient, timely, eminently readable, and socially important.”—Stephen Casper, Clarkson University

“The future of American football will not be determined by a handful of NFL owners or a few hundred college presidents but by millions of parents deciding whether the game is too dangerous for their sons in the era of CTE.  Kathleen Bachynski’s groundbreaking history of a century-long medical and cultural debate about youth football, its obvious risks and assumed benefits, could not be more timely.”–Michael Oriard, author of Bowled Over, Brand NFL, and King Football