Image 1: Black and white photo of a team of football players posed for a group photo. Image 2: Modern photo of leather football cleats.

The Beautiful Game

Closes Sept. 14, 2026 Exhibit Hall

As Kansas City welcomes the world for the 2026 FIFA World Cup, football (soccer) fans from every corner of the globe will discover The Beautiful Game, an extraordinary exhibition revealing the profound connections between the world's most beloved sport and the Great War.

It is summer, 1914. Football (soccer) athletes, league officials and fans around the world were planning and preparing for kick-off – but then came the fateful declarations of war. The bugles began calling for volunteers to serve on the battlefield rather than the football pitch.

Yet “the beautiful game” had its role to play during World War I.

As a rallying cry:

Numerous belligerent nations used football to recruit for the citizen armies they were raising.

  • Photo of a board game depicting a crooked "trench" that a ball bearing rolls along attempting to avoid holes cut into the trench along the way.

  • British “Trench Football” Board Game

    At bottom is the “kick” spot where a ball bearing starts with the goal of getting to the “goal” at the top, being an image of the Kaiser’s open mouth.

    Object ID: 2025.18.1

  • Pair of leather boot-shaped footwear with thick cleats on the sole.
    Leather boot-shaped footwear, each one laid on its side so viewer can see six thick cleats attached to the soles

    Leather Football Cleats

    Object ID: 2025.19.1

As a morale-raiser:

Even before the war, militaries had already been adopting football for training, fitness and esprit de corps.

Black and white photo of WWI soldiers stripped down to shirtsleeves playing a game of football in a field surrounded by trees. Abandoned clothes and equipment lie nearby under a tree.

Belgian soldiers playing football on the frontlines

Object ID: 2025.115.1

Modern photograph of a field of cracked dirt. A deflated brown football/soccer ball sits in the foreground.

The London Irish “Loos Football”

On Sept. 25, 1915, on the opening day of the Battle of Loos, the London Irish Rifles, 18th Battalion, London Regiment took a football and kicked it ahead of them as they attacked the German lines to the west of the mining town of Loos.

Photograph by Michael St Maur Sheil
Object ID: 2021.169.246

Black and white photo of a group of German soldiers in different WWI uniforms, posed standing, sitting and lying down along with a football/soccer ball.

German soldiers with football

Object ID: 2024.188.1

As an escape:

Whether people served on the frontlines or the home front, they turned to football for mental refuge from the hardships they faced.

Black and white photo of men playing football on a field with barracks in the background

German civilian prisoners of war playing football at Ile Longue Internment Camp

Object ID: 2022.4.8

Large silver trophy shaped like a two-handled amphora

Charles-Simon Trophy

Original trophy of the Coupe de France national football tournament, first held in 1917.

From the collection of the French Football Federation

Chart the rise of football (for players and supporters) in the years before the Great War, then journey through the story of its impact on WWI and explore the poignant influence of “the beautiful game” on people living during wartime.

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Included with General Admission.

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Presented by Bank of America logo

 

 

 

This project is supported in part by the City of Kansas City, Missouri Neighborhood Tourist Development Fund

NTDF Neighborhood Tourist Development Fund logo

 

 

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