<P> Professionals and amateurs alike wear protective head gear to reduce the chance of injury while playing American football . The football helmet has changed over time and many different materials have become available . The rules of the game have changed as well . </P> <P> In 1888 the college football rules convention voted to allow tackling below the waist . Players and coaches soon regarded pads as essential for the game . However, as in the National Hockey League during the 1970s, helmets were the last thing to be accepted . They were not a mandatory piece of equipment in college gridiron until 1939 and were not made mandatory in the National Football League until 1943 As a side note, "the last NFL player to play in a game without a helmet was Dick Plasman an end for the Chicago Bears in 1940 ." There is a photograph of him without one taken during the 1940 NFL Championship Game in which Chicago defeated the Washington Redskins 73--0 . </P> <P> Before the invention of the football helmet, players would often grow their hair long, because they believed it would protect their heads . The man largely credited with inventing the first helmet was George Barclay . In 1896 he designed a headgear which soon became known as a "head harness". It had three thick leather straps forming a close fit around his head, made by a harness maker . Additionally, other sources credit the invention of the football helmet to U.S. Naval Academy Midshipman Joseph M. Reeves (later to become the "Father of Carrier Aviation"), who had a protective device for his head made out of mole skin to allow him to play in the 1893 Army - Navy Game after he was told by a Navy doctor that he must give up football or risk death from another kick in the head . Reeves went to a local shoemaker / blacksmith and had a crude leather helmet fabricated to protect his skull . Before the first helmet, Edgar Allan Poe III (grandnephew of the famous writer) developed a small leather nose protector which, however, was found to severely interfere with vision and breathing and to come off easily </P>

When did they stop using leather football helmets