Stories
The vanished
26 programs won the belt, held it, and then dropped out of its story — no belt game since before 1960. Some of them are the dynasties that built it. Ranked by how much of the belt’s history they own.
26former holders with no belt game since before 1960
No. 1 Princeton — last seen 1952
Princeton held the belt 9 times for 6,883 days in all, with 98 defenses; the best of it was 7 yrs, 17 days starting November 13, 1869, taken from Rutgers.
Its last belt game of any kind was Pennsylvania 13–7 Princeton on October 11, 1952 — 74 years ago. It has played for the belt 128 times.
No. 2 Yale — last seen 1951
Yale held the belt 7 times for 4,704 days in all, with 126 defenses; the best of it was 3 yrs, 3 days starting November 27, 1890, taken from Princeton.
Its last belt game of any kind was Princeton 27–0 Yale on November 17, 1951 — 75 years ago. It has played for the belt 157 times.
No. 3 Harvard — last seen 1951
Harvard held the belt 10 times for 3,015 days in all, with 82 defenses; the best of it was 2 yrs, 355 days starting November 2, 1912, taken from Princeton.
Its last belt game of any kind was Princeton 54–13 Harvard on November 10, 1951 — 75 years ago. It has played for the belt 121 times.
No. 4 Pennsylvania — last seen 1952
Pennsylvania held the belt 4 times for 1,484 days in all, with 55 defenses; the best of it was 1 yr, 349 days starting November 10, 1894, taken from Princeton.
Its last belt game of any kind was Penn State 14–7 Pennsylvania on November 1, 1952 — 74 years ago. It has played for the belt 100 times.
No. 5 Villanova — last seen 1957
Villanova held the belt 2 times for 660 days in all, with 7 defenses; the best of it was 357 days starting November 17, 1928, taken from Grove City.
Its last belt game of any kind was Baylor 7–0 Villanova on September 21, 1957 — 69 years ago. It has played for the belt 16 times.
No. 6 Columbia — last seen 1952
Columbia held the belt 2 times for 635 days in all, with 7 defenses; the best of it was 343 days starting October 25, 1947, taken from Army.
Its last belt game of any kind was Pennsylvania 27–17 Columbia on October 18, 1952 — 74 years ago. It has played for the belt 30 times.
No. 7 Cornell — last seen 1951
Cornell held the belt 2 times for 385 days in all, with 8 defenses; the best of it was 1 yr, 5 days starting October 23, 1915, taken from Harvard.
Its last belt game of any kind was Princeton 53–15 Cornell on October 27, 1951 — 75 years ago. It has played for the belt 27 times.
No. 8 Swarthmore — last seen 1922
Swarthmore held the belt 2 times for 371 days in all, with 5 defenses; the best of it was 343 days starting October 29, 1904, taken from Navy.
Its last belt game of any kind was Princeton 22–13 Swarthmore on November 4, 1922 — 104 years ago. It has played for the belt 11 times.
The full roll
26 of the 101 programs that have ever held the belt have not played a belt game since before 1960. The oldest goodbyes: Carlisle (1915), Chicago (1922), Swarthmore (1922), West Virginia Wesleyan (1925), Lehigh (1925), Muhlenberg (1925), Duquesne (1928), Geneva (1928), Grove City (1928), Lebanon Valley (1929), and 16 more.
Some of these programs still play, a few divisions down; some dropped football in the Depression or the war years; a couple no longer exist as institutions. The lineage does not distinguish. A reign is a reign, and every current holder traces its title straight back through these names.
Why the belt remembers them
This is the part of the belt that no poll or playoff can reproduce. A ranking starts over every August; a lineal title cannot. The reason the belt is where it is today is a chain of specific Saturdays, and dozens of the links in that chain belong to programs the modern sport has forgotten. Take any one of them out and the belt is somewhere else.
The nearest any of these has come to a return is the schedule: none of them has played a current belt holder in decades. The My Team page will tell you how far away each one is, which for most of them is “not this century.”
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