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  • 1883 - Great Britain: students began cheering their favorite athletes at sporting events.
  • 1884 - Princeton: Thomas Peebles carried a yell of "Sis Boom Rah!"
  • 1889 - U of MN: Johnny Campbell was the first cheerleader. It was the last football game of the season. Gophers against Northwestern. Johnny got up at yelled with a megaphone "Rah, Rah, Rah! Ski-U-Mah! Hoo-Rah! Varsity! Minn-e-so-tah!". After that people called him a yell leader & a yell marshal. The Ariel Newspaper reported by the first ever yell leaders at the U of MN.
  • 1899 - U of MN: Johnny & five friends (Kotlaba, Luby, Armstrong, Wickerham, & Litzeenburg) organized cheers, fight songs and raised school pride. (This was the first cheerleading squad - made up of ALL guys.)
  • 1903 - Gramma Sigma is named the first cheerleading fraternity.
  • 1905 - Texas A&M: bring Texas "the cheerleading state" into the sport with their still male only yell leaders.
  • 1910 - U of IL: held the first Homecoming Week
  • 1923 - U of MN: female students are allowed to cheer. They bring gymnastics & tumbling to the routines.
  • 1925 - Oregon State: Lindley Bothwell makes the first flash cards.
  • 1927 - Wills Bugbee writing the first book of cheers called "Just Yells".
  • 1936 - Minnesota: The father of cheerleading dies in an automobile accident during a blizzard.
  • 1940 - WW2 allows more females to join cheerleading squads
  • 1948 - Sam Houston State: Lawrence Herkimer gathers 52 students to have a summer cheerleading clinic (one of them being Aaron Spelling - who at the time was a friend of Lawrence). CraBerry is also founded that year.
  • 1949 - Dallas: Herkimer has the first workshop under the NCA name.
  • 1950 - Santa Cruz, CA: the 49ers cheer squad (who were high school cheerleaders) go to summer camp. Herkimer develops the Herkie jump & NCA in incorporated.
  • 1953 - Herkimer founds the Cheerleading Supply Company.
  • 1956 - Herkimer invents the first pompom.
  • 1957 - NCA creates the first Spirit Stick.
  • 1960 - Baltimore: the Colts add the first professional cheerleading squad in history.
  • 1963 - Pep Supply is founded.
  • 1964 - U of Kansas: Randy Neil founds the ICF.
  • 1967 - Pop Warners cheerleaders are added to pee wee football.
  • 1968 - Fred Gasthoff makes the first vinyl pompom.
  • 1971 - ICF invents the "Cheerleader All         America Award" for outstanding sportsmanship is cheerleading.
  • 1972 - Title IX was passed. Varsity is founded, so was the famous Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders.
  • 1973 - Cheerleaders start cheerleading woman's sports.
  • 1974 - Jeff Webbs quits his VP/General Manager job with NCA to start up UCA.
  • 1976 - Miami at Superbowl X: a TV camera captured one of the Dallas Cowboys Cheerleader's "All American" wink. Sending then into a status almost unreachable. UCA also shows the first liberty at their summer camp.
  • 1978 - ICF hosts the first televised NCCC on CBS.
  • 1979 - UCA shows the basket toss at summer camp.
  • 1980 - All Star Squad start popping up everywhere.
  • 1981 - New safety guidelines are made.
  • 1982 - Cheerleading comes back to Great Britain and to Germany, Japan and Sweden as while. Bob Kiralfy is made president of the BCA and the Cheerleader Quarterly is published.
  • 1983 - ESPN starts broadcasting the NHSCC.
  • 1984 - NCCC is founded by Gwen Holtsclaw.
  • 1985 - Score Camps Inc. is founded. (1989 changed to FCC)
  • 1988 - Minnesota: Lisa Saline founds the UPA.
  • 1992 - NCA invents Bleacher Mania
  • 1995 - American Cheerleader Magazine & Cheers And More Newsletter make their debuts while Disney World becomes the "cheer mecca" of the US.
  • 1997 - Cheers And More Newsletter changes to a magazine and adds their websites. 15 states say that cheerleading is a sport.
  • 1998 - Minnesota: The Cheerleading Alliance is founded.
  • 1999 - ESPN on the record says they feel competition cheerleading is a sport and does a two page write up on the U of KY cheerleaders. Later that year am ESPN columnist cut down the sport and say it's nothing but cheap entertainment.
  • 2000 - Cheerleading Alliance changes to Cheer & Dance Alliance, and Drill Team Exchange changes to DanceCheer.NET as there is an ever growing need for both cheer & dance information. Cheers And More Magazine changes their format to include all spirit sports. In Motion Magazine is brought out by Dance Spirit Magazine. Cheerleaders do a cheer on MTV's TRL for the first time.

 

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