I found this info on the net so it must be true. There was a HS and college football and basketball official in Michigan named Dr. Lloyd Olds. He, like other officials, would always wear a white shirt to games (some of them even wore neckties or bow ties). In 1920, he was working a college football game, wearing his white shirt as usual, and one of the quarterbacks handed off the ball to him during a play.
He realized he needed to change his "uniform". He asked a friend to make him a black and white striped shirt and he wore it to a state championship basketball game in 1921. The idea caught on and that's how the striped shirt became part of our uniform.
I'm still trying to find info on how we got the black and white striped thong.
