Detroit Titans Football Page
 
DETROIT (10/30/2012) -- The Detroit Titans football program will forever be remembered thanks to the work of the University of Detroit Football Collection that has been gathered and digitized by the University of Detroit Mercy Library staff at the McNichols campus.
 
The Detroit football program played its final season in 1964 after starting in 1896. The first ever game was a 4-4 tie in 1896 with the Detroit School for Boys and the first team win was a 30-0 victory over the Alumni in 1896.
 
The collection includes a brief history lesson, year-by-year game programs, the ability to search and look up individual names of football players to see the programs they are listed in and also a few select audio interviews with alums. You can access the Detroit Titans football page which houses links to the full collection and other information by CLICKING HERE.
 
Thanks to the work of many individuals within the library system at the University of Detroit Mercy, the work of gathering the info and making the works available in an online format was a process that was helped greatly by technology.
 
“Our document scanner really helped us get this project off the ground,” said Russell Davidson who works as a Director and Senior Instructional Designer in the UDM library. “That's what allows us to scan items without breaking the spine. You can set the document in a position where it's going to be comfortable for the books and you can still get a clear picture from both sides.”
 
Another part of the library collection is the various audio interviews from former football players at Detroit. These interviews came about as the University hosted one its annual alumni nights at Comerica Park and Margaret Auer, the Dean of University Libraries/Instructional Design Studio, bumped into a number of Titans at the event. The conversation led to Auer and Tony Cressey, an Instructional Designer at the library, being invited to the next social outings and the audio interviews were recorded, edited, and added to the collection.
 
Cressey, who has been a major force in helping put the collection together, said they would definitely be interested in more audio interviews if more football alums were able to come forward with stories to tell.
 
“I think that'd be a good addition to the collection. I'm sure people would be interested to listen to more stories,” said Cressey.
 
The ability to do more with the football collections is being worked on while the possibility of working with other sports in the future is a potential option moving forward.  There are a number of other collections online including the school's Tower Yearbooks, Thesis Collections, Commencement, Sisters of Mercy Collections, and the Society of Jesus so there are other areas with online information that the library staff continues to work with in the meantime.
 
“There's definitely interest in doing more athletics stuff because that's an area where you have an active alumni community that we would like to help serve,” said Davidson. “When we get through some of the projects we have on our plate right now, it's definitely something we would be open to talking about.”
 
The work of the collections was a combined effort from Davidson and Cressey, Auer, Pat Higo, Linda Papa, Josh Duffy and others in the library including a large number of student workers.
 
The final win and home game for the Titan football program was a 28-7 victory over Virginia Military Institute on Nov. 6, 1964. The last game played was a 17-9 loss at Boston College on Nov. 21, 1964.
 
If you are a Titan football alum with a story to tell for an interview or you have programs or media guides you would like to donate to the archives, please contact the sports information office at 313-993-1745.