Necessity is the mother of invention … how Joe Reeves got ahead of the game
By Craig Holamon
Most of you probably never heard of Joseph Mason Reeves but he was an innovator and war hero who took a simple idea and ran with it. Like the guy who invented thumbtacks or sticky notes, he changed everything.
The late Joseph Mason Reeves was a player with a head injury. The solution he created in order to keep playing changed the game, which he played over 100 years ago, forever.
His invention, although surprisingly simple, has saved countless lives and prevented thousands of injuries. His invention is still a mainstay of the modern game.
Here’s a look at the man who invented the football helmet:
I
n 1893, the Navy doctor told Annapolis football player Joseph Mason Reeves that he must give up football or risk death from another kick in the head. Reeves went to a local shoemaker or blacksmith and had a crude leather helmet fabricated to protect his skull.
Another interesting fact was that nearly all of the games in this era were played in unadorned helmets — school logos colors and mascots were rarely used. As the great rivalries grew colleges and high schools began to hand-paint their helmets. The idea was that the simple colors, in the first days of the forward pass, allowed receivers to finally be distinguishable to the quarterback when they were heavily covered and far down the field. Not until 1948 was the first logo, the Rams horns, painted on a pro leather helmet. Soon after, practically every college, pro and high school team put their logos and mascots on their helmets. But the great old leather helmet was spared much of this “clutter” as its days faded into history before 1950.
More on Joseph Reeves:
Admiral Joseph Mason "Bull" Reeves, USN
(1872-1948)
The history of Naval Aviation in California would not be complete without including the biography of Admiral Joseph Mason Reeves, for whom two naval airfields in California have been named – the first, NAS Terminal Island, and the second, NAS Lemoore.
Joseph Mason Reeves was born in Tampico, Illinois, on November 20, 1872. He was appointed to the Naval Academy from the Seventh District of Illinois in 1890. Reeves was an avid football player as a Naval Cadet.
Sea-based naval aviation had yet to demonstrate any offensive prowess that would dispel the traditional tenet of the supremacy of the battleship. All of this was about to change.
In 1925, Captain Joseph M. Reeves, who had watched aviation concepts tested at the War College and who also served as a member of the tactics faculty, took command of the fleet's aviation squadrons. Living up to his nickname, "Bull" Reeves drove his charges hard, demanding that his pilots push the limits. He ordered the commander of the LANGLEY to increase the number of airplanes she operated, and drilled the pilots and deck crews incessantly in an effort to reduce the time it took to launch and recover aircraft. Under his leadership, the LANGLEY began to conduct a series of experiments that led to such innovations as crash barriers and the deck park, which enabled the ship to more than double its aircraft complement and dramatically increase its sortie rate. Due to these innovations, LANGLEY stopped being an experiment and became an operational carrier, with 36 (and eventually 42) operational aircraft.
On December 13, 1926, Reeves, commanding Aircraft Squadrons, Battle Fleet, reported on the results of the first dive-bombing exercise ("light bombing," as it was then called) to be conducted in the formal fleet gunnery competition. One Marine and two Navy fighter squadrons and three Navy observation squadrons participated. The Marine and Navy fighters made 45 degree dives from 2,500 feet and at an altitude of 400 feet, dropped 25 pound fragmentation bombs; observation squadrons similarly attacked from 1,000 feet. Pilots of VF-2, commanded by Lieutenant Commander Frank D. Wagner and flying F6Cs and FB-5s, scored 19 hits with 45 bombs on a target 100 feet by 45 feet. The uses visualized for this tactic included disabling or demolishing flight decks, destroying enemy aircraft in flight, attacking exposed personnel on ship or shore and attacking light surface craft and submarines.
Following a six-week period of closely observing his air forces, Reeves called his officers together at North Island, California, and delivered a history-making lecture. He was blunt in his opinion that his aviators lacked insight into both the capabilities and limitations of their weapons and were, therefore, totally unprepared to conduct fleet air tactics. He then challenged his men to answer "Reeves' Thousand and One Questions," which were mimeographed sheets circulated to all squadrons. The answer to critical questions such as "How can we bomb effectively?" -- were analyzed, refined and developed until the compilation of this work became "Aircraft Squadrons, Battle Fleet Tactical Instructions, 1928."
Reeves used annual fleet exercises (Fleet Problems) to demonstrate new tactics, such as high-speed long-distance steaming combined with undetected predawn launches and coordinated dive-bomb attacks against targets ashore. Finally, Reeves seized upon opportunities to demonstrate the offensive potential of the carrier. During war games, he foreshadowed the Day of Infamy by launching a dawn attack against Pearl Harbor.
Reeves pushed the envelope of what those early aviators thought they could do; he challenged Fighting Squadron One to make as many landings and takeoffs on LANGLEY as possible in one day, while he clocked them from the bridge. Within a year he increased the number of aircraft embarked on LANGLEY from 8 to 30. By mid-1928 Reeve's technique of flight deck stowage and handling resulted in an increase from 72 to 90 aircraft embarked aboard both LEXINGTON (CV-2) and SARATOGA (CV-3).
In January 1929, the U.S. Navy undertook another exercise known as Fleet Problem Nine. Fleet Problem Nine took place off the coast of Panama. Present for the first time in these fleet problems were two ships of radically new design—the aircraft carriers USS LEXINGTON (CV-2) and USS SARATOGA (CV-3). During the exercise, Vice Admiral William V. Pratt, commanding the attacking force, authorized Rear Admiral Reeves, commanding the SARATOGA and a light cruiser as escort, to execute a high-speed run toward the Panama Canal. "We take off at 3:30 a.m. to bomb the canal," an excited Lieutenant Artie Doyle wrote on the eve of the landmark attack, "They haven't a chance to stop us." Reeves "attacked" the canal with a seventy-plane strike force launched 140 miles from the target.
"The planes struck without warning in an attack deemed so effective by the referees that they ruled the locks at the Pacific end of the canal destroyed."
The SARATOGA's performance changed naval warfare; she had demonstrated that a speedy aircraft carrier could independently attack enemy installations with devastating results. Admiral William V. Pratt, the Black Fleet Commander for this exercise, was so impressed that he moved his flag to the USS SARATOGA for the return trip to the United States.
In his post-exercise critique, Admiral Pratt made the following comment, "Gentlemen, you have witnessed the most brilliantly conceived and most effectively executed naval operation in our history… I believe that when we learn more of the possibilities of the carrier we will come to an acceptance of Admiral Reeves' plan which provides for a very powerful and mobile force . . . the nucleus of which is the carrier."
For his meritorious service during the World War II period he was awarded the Distinguished Service Medal.
On December 23, 1946, he was ordered relieved of all active duty, thus ending his naval career at the age of 74. He died on March 25, 1948 at the United States Naval Medical Center, Bethesda, Maryland. He was survived by his son, Joseph M. Reeves, Jr., who resided in Los Angeles, California at the time of his own death.
In addition to the Navy Cross and the Distinguished Service Medal, Admiral Reeves had the Sampson Medal (USS OREGON); Spanish Campaign Medal (Spanish-American War); Victory Medal with Atlantic Fleet Clasp (World War I); American Defense Service Medal; American Campaign Medal; and the World War II Victory Medal. From the Government of Italy he was awarded the Crown of Italy (rank of Commander) and the Diploma of the Order of Saints Maurice and Lazarus (grade of Commendatore).
Admirals Joseph Mason Reeves' foresight laid the foundation for modern carrier striking forces. He and Rear Admiral William Adger Moffett was of the same school of thought that naval aviation would decide the outcome of future naval surface engagements between two opposing fleets in the expanses of the Pacific Ocean.
Admiral Reeves and his closest aviation proponents knew that the Navy would have to be prepared to deal with the rising naval aviation within the Empire of Japan, and that our battle tactics had to be written for such an engagement, no matter what the battleship admirals thought. The realism and sense of urgency Reeves imparted to fleet air operations and later to the entire U.S. fleet served the nation well.