Bluford Library Archives – The Origins of the Aggie-Eagle Classic

In the fall semester, Aggies look forward to Football season, and besides Homecoming, the most anticipated battle on the field is the Aggie-Eagle Classic. For over a century, North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University and North Carolina Central University in Durham have been close allies, as well as rivals. Situated only 55 miles apart, the game, generations of Aggie faculty and staff are North Carolina Central alumni, and many Central faculty and staff are “Aggie Born and Bred.” Many families boast of having alumni from both HBCUs (Historically Black Colleges and Universities). This closeness and competition for students and faculty have fueled the spirit of this rivalry to this day. Between two competitive universities, what better way to declare victory than to be a winner of a rousing football game?  

Beginning in 2019, a team of historians, archivists, and museum curators from Greensboro and Durham began to collect and document histories about the rivalry. This has led to a new exhibit called “More Than Just A Game: The Aggie-Eagle Football Rivalry,” which will open in late October 2021. This joint exhibit will be at the Greensboro History Museum and the Durham Museum of History and will feature interviews, rare photographs, footage, and new histories of the greatest sports rivalry in the southeast. Without spoiling too many surprises of the new exhibit, the following is an overview of how the Aggies began to compete with the Eagles. 

In most college histories, the first Aggie Eagle game was said to have been on Saturday, November 22, 1924, and ended with a tie of 13 –13. Recent research in the Bluford Library Archives has shown that the rivalry began a few years earlier on Thursday, November 23, 1922. On that day, the A&T College (now North Carolina A&T State University) football team defeated the Durham State Normal School for Negroes (now North Carolina Central University) 26-0. The game took place at “Dudley Field” the old athletic grounds on the A&T campus where the Holland Bowl and Williams Cafeteria stands today. The 1922 and 1924 games took place before A&T would join the Colored (Central) Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (CIAA) in December 1924. North Carolina Central would join the CIAA in 1928. Only in 1929, 1943 to 1944 because of World War II and the pandemic in 2020, has this Classic been canceled or unscheduled.  

The earliest days of the rivalry favored the Aggies with three games won in a row in 1925, 1927, 1928. Under Coach Lonnie P. Byarm Sr., A&T ‘1911, the A&T Aggies became known as “the Bulldogs” and the 1927 CIAA Championship winners. To date Coach Byarm is one of only three A&T football coaches with an undefeated season. This included winning against N.C. Central in October 1927 with a score of 28 – 13. Byarm left A&T College to be the coach at Johnson C. Smith at the end of the decade. Under coaches Harry Jefferson and Inman A. Breaux, A&T continued to turn out many fine athletes, most famously Charles U. DeBerry (A&T Sports Hall of Fame 1971). However, the games began to favor the Eagles, who won four in a row from 1930 –1933, three with a losing score of “0.”  

The “Good Old Aggie Spirit” was not diminished, and from 1934 to 1940, the Aggies defeated Central seven games in a row. In five of those games, the Aggies left Central with a score of “0.” In the early 1930s, the game was played for the first time on Thanksgiving and was known for years as the “Thanksgiving Day Classic.” The culture of having a large homecoming and grand game day experiences also emerged during the 1930s with bands performing and (competing) during the games.  

With succeeding generations, the rivalry between A&T and North Carolina Central would continue to grow and expand. Both institutions would see future NFL & AFL players, civil rights activists on the field, and the games would attract increasing numbers of fans.  

This history and the content of the coming exhibit were collected and preserved by generations of archivists, alumni, coaches, professors of public & oral history at North Carolina A&T State University, North Carolina Central University, the Greensboro History Museum, and the Durham Museum of History. The F. D. Bluford Library Archives and Special Collections has several collections on the MEAC and CIAA sports teams, players, and coaches. For more information about this story, or if you have any questions about A&T History please contact the University Archives at libraryarchives@ncat.edu. Also, for more Aggie History please visit the University Archives home page, our Digital Collections, and the Archives and Special Collections LibGuide. 

By James Stewart, Archives and Special Collections Librarian 

F.D. Bluford Library