How and Why The Little Brown Jug Rivalry Actually Started (1903-1909)

While Fielding H. Yost tends to get top billing when discussing the origins of the Little Brown Jug rivalry, the fact is that Minnesota AD L.J. “Doc” Cooke is the man primarily responsible for creating this tradition.

Michigan’s student assistant, Tommy Roberts, bought the jug and was likely the one who left it behind in Minnesota back in 1903. Gopher custodian Oscar Munson found the jug sometime after the game and brought it to Cooke (where they promptly gave it its first paint job). Without Munson and Roberts, the physical trophy wouldn’t exist—but it was primarily Cooke (not Yost) who was responsible for getting the teams to play for the jug every year starting in 1909. Some of this history has been published elsewhere over the years (GoBlueWolverine, the Ann Arbor Observer, etc.), but it hasn’t made its way here until now.

The first thing to understand is just how wild and varied the documented stories of the Jug’s origin were during the first couple of decades. I covered this in an earlier LBJ Lore post. For instance, right after the 1909 game, Minnesota coach Doc Williams claimed that Michigan carried the jug with them all year in 1903 (false), painted scores on it (false), and that Minnesota “willfully stole the jug” that season (also false). In 1919, the Minnesota Tribune wrote that the Gophers originally stole it from a gym in Ann Arbor (false), prompting Michigan to write a letter demanding its return (false). In 1920, the Michigan Daily even suggested the jug was a good luck charm for Michigan during the 1903 season (false). Because the Williams quote came out immediately after the 1909 game, it really got me wondering if the whole “Yost wrote Minnesota demanding his jug back” legend actually had any teeth. So, I dug a little deeper.

In 2004, the Minneapolis Star-Tribune published a piece called “Minnesota Myths” that took a fresh look at some of the state’s fabled traditions. In it, writer Joel Rippel brought to light an alternate explanation of the birth of the rivalry, documented by Doc Cooke himself. A paper written in 1929 by the former athletic director offered a much less sexy version of how the tradition actually started. I contacted the Minnesota library and obtained a copy of what appears to be an early draft of Cooke’s memoir, complete with several handwritten edits.

In A Brief History of the Little Brown Jug, there is absolutely no mention of a letter, wire, or request of any kind from Michigan or Yost. Instead, Cooke reveals that he and Gopher captain John McGovern simply met prior to the 1909 game and decided the jug “might be material to build up a fine tradition.” Cooke writes that McGovern brought the proposal to Yost and Michigan’s captain, who “immediately approved the idea, and so the tradition was inaugurated.”

In that same 1929 draft, Cooke wrote: “A rope loop was tied to the handle of the jug and the jug was suspended from a hook above my desk, where it remained unmolested for six years…”

I found an awesome photo from the Minnesota Library of Cooke’s office inside the Minnesota Armory dated to 1905, showing the would-be trophy hanging from the ceiling, validating at least that part of Cooke’s story. This is also backed up by a piece in the February 14, 1904 Detroit Free Press describing the placement of Cooke’s new souvenir.

To see just how willing sportswriters were to embellish the story, consider how Cooke’s own 1929 paper was spiced up when it was reprinted in a 1941 Minnesota game program. What began as a polite proposal in the ’29 draft (“It was suggested that the jug might be material to build up a fine tradition between the two institutions, and John was appointed a committee of one to present the matter to Mr. Yost…”) evolved into a fiery, dramatic instruction from Cooke to McGovern in the ’41 program: “You tell that Michigan captain that they can have their jug back if they beat us tomorrow.” Now we’re talking!

But we don’t have to just take Cooke’s version. In 1953, around the 50th anniversary of the famous 1903 game, Oscar Munson himself wrote down his recollection of the origins. Shortly after finding the jug, he claims he asked Cooke if they should return it to Yost, to which Cooke barked back, “Heck no, make him win it back.” When the Wolverines finally returned six years later, Munson recalled this scene in Cooke’s office:

“We didn’t play Michigan until 1909. The day before the game, Coach Yost came into Doc’s office for a visit as usual. The first thing he saw was that old water jug hanging in the ceiling. ‘What’s that?’ he asked Doc. He told him it was the water jug Michigan had left behind six years ago. ‘That’s the first time I heard about that,’ laughed Yost. Doc suggested Michigan should try to win it back and it was all right with Yost.”

Munson retold essentially the same version in a 1960 interview shortly before he passed away: “When Yost came to see Cooke [in 1909] he saw the jug. They decided to let it go back and forth with the winner of the game.”

There are plenty of reasons to believe Munson’s words. Given that the jug was hastily purchased right before the 1903 game, it’s not surprising that Yost didn’t remember it—or that he hadn’t even realized Minnesota had confiscated it six years earlier. I mean, why would he really care? There was no reason for Yost to bother writing or wiring Minnesota about a missing 5-gallon jug his manager bought on the fly, even if he did know they left it behind. The crock only cost about 30 cents, and with game tickets going for around $2 to $3 that season, it was hardly a high-value item.

To put that value into context, according to the November 3, 1903 edition of the Minnesota Daily, the gross proceeds from that game were nearly $31,000, to be split between the teams. After expenses, the November 4, 1903 Detroit Free Press reported that Michigan netted a cool $13,000. At thirty cents a pop, Yost could have used that payout to buy over 40,000 Red Wing jugs!

Even if we pretend Yost did care about leaving the jug behind—maybe he was just incredibly cheap—was he really expecting Minnesota to drop it in the mail or haul it onto a train back to Ann Arbor? (“Be extra careful with it, Doc, it’s fragile!”) Imagine what that shipping cost would look like.

Now, let’s say Munson and Cooke conspired in their writings to tilt history and make the rivalry a purely Minnesota-created tradition. Fine. But look at the account of Tommy Roberts, the actual Michigan manager who bought the jug in 1903. He published his own version around the 50th anniversary as well. Not only did he confirm the crock was bought in Minneapolis (a fact that wasn’t widely known until then), but Roberts recalled that it was Minnesota who reached out to Michigan before the 1909 game, essentially saying, “We have your Little Brown Jug, come and win it.”

Assuming Roberts was at least partially responsible for leaving the jug behind, he certainly would have known if Yost wanted it back. Heck, he probably would have gotten an earful for losing it. Yet Roberts mentions zero desire from Michigan or Yost to have the jug returned. Instead, just as he wrote, it was a one-way challenge issued by the Gophers in the days leading up to the 1909 matchup.

I’ve found other contemporary writings that support Cooke’s version, too. Dr. Willie Kerr Foster, a gym coach at Minnesota from 1905 to 1929, included an account of Cooke’s role in his paper, The Doctor Cooke that I Knew. Kerr notes that Doc was simply looking for material for a speech prior to the 1909 Michigan-Minnesota rematch, and that brainstorming session sparked the idea of playing for the jug. Kerr portrays Cooke as a humble guy who never “wished any credit for the part he played in establishing this marvelous college tradition,” which explains why Cooke gave captain McGovern a joint role in his 1929 memoir. On top of that, the Minnesota Daily archives reveal that Cooke did indeed flash the jug at a pep rally right before the 1909 kickoff.

While there are subtle differences between the Munson and Roberts accounts, Cooke’s version holds a lot of water. Applying a bit of Occam’s razor here: when handed a bevy of romantic, mythologized explanations—ranging from Coach Henry Williams’ immediate postgame quotes, to the Minneapolis Tribune claiming it was stolen out of Ann Arbor, to the 1920 Michigan Daily good luck charm, right down to today’s standard legend of Yost pleading for his precious jug back—Cooke’s story is by far the simplest and most reasonable. Plus, since almost every account agrees that the challenge to play for the crock originated with Cooke, shouldn’t we consider his own words the most reliable?

Funny enough, the one man who stayed conspicuously quiet about the whole thing was Yost, someone who otherwise never seemed to keep his mouth shut—whether talking to the press or writing stacks of letters (many of which are archived at the U-M Bentley Historical Museum). That said, would it shock anyone if, decades down the road, Yost spun a yarn to a nearby reporter about how much it “hurt” when he realized he’d left that five-gallon jug behind in 1903?

Related: Little Brown Jug Lore