was a Glee Club and a Mandolin Club. But the key activities of the campus in those early years centered in two literary organizations known as the "Philadelphian" and "Philosophic" Societies. These groups strove continually to outdo one another, and the struggle culminated always in the Inter-Society Contest on Commencement Week. There were orations, essays, declama– tions, debates, musical numbers; and the mem– bers still argue the merits of their respective societies after fifty yearsP Not all the campus activities were academic. There was also a vigorous athletic program. For the men the major sports were football and baseball. The sports were played on a more casual basis than today. There were no eligibility requirements, so faculty, staff, students, and even townspeople played on both the football and baseball teams. Neither team was particularly distinguished in those early days, although the football team prospered when Coach Scarff came from Wooster to Cedarville. Scarff not only coached the team; he played. Write-ups of the day say that he was in poor condition physically, and opposing players wondered what he would have been like if he had eaten his Wheaties. Other teams remember Scarff as mostly steel springs infused with wildcat's blood, and wished that he would stick to coaching. 18 Basketball began slightly after football and baseball, and even the women competed in this sport. But to do so the Cedarville women had to form two teams of their own, since they could find no other women's teams to play! In February 1898, Cedarville introduced women's basketball to Xenia, scheduling a match between their two teams in an old skating rink. A reporter from the Xenia Gazette urged people to witness the spectacle, and advised, "This game will be strictly moral and first class, and no lady need be backward about attending."l~ Xenia folks packed the rink and the women came back to Cedarville with a $100.00 profit!20 Women's basketball was the most successful sport at Cedarville in those early years. The 1911 team was undefeated, and though no formal state championships were held in those days, area newspapers called the Cedarville woman "state champions" after their stunning The proposed women's dormitory to be built with funds from the capital campaign of 1921. 48/Chapter VI