Saturday, February 24, 2007
Baylor History, Part Ten!
Because of the sad fate of her beloved father, Liz Baylor deeply resented the choice of the bear as Baylor’s mascot by the Board of Intenders in 1907, and more than once attempted to kill the live bears kept on campus. Her last attempt to do so was in 1911, when she tied up one such bear, loaded it onto a motor lorry which was then put onto a frigate in Lake Waco. Once in the middle of the lake, she pushed the bear off the back end of the boat to ensure its demise. Much to her surprise, the bear proved to be a strong swimmer, and eventually clamored aboard an abandoned rowboat, which it successfully piloted to shore by paddling with its large paws. Eventually, the bear caught up with Liz Baylor herself on the shore, leaving a long gash on her arm, which was very nearly severed, before the bear escaped into the woods. This episode, the only known instance of an American black bear piloting a leisure vessel, was enshrined for years as the genesis of Baylor’s old “Sailor Bear” mascot, which was popular from 1912 until 1943, when it was dropped due to the fact that a German U-Boat which terrorized trans-Atlantic shipping was learned to be called “Baylorsgebang- bruindasboot,” with a picture of the Baylor mascot stenciled on its side next to the Nazi swastika. A German propoganda photo of that juxtaposition appeared in the New York Afternoon Democrat in May, 1943, bringing many questions from the Yankee intelligensia about the connections between the Third Reich and Baylor University (and the entire Southwest Conference).
Once established in Waco, Baylor continued to grow in size and stature among learned academies. In this period, the school focused on a core curriculum of Latin, rhetoric, history, dentistry and fashion merchandising, with no electives outside of these areas being allowed. Significantly, each student had to take an equal number of classes in each discipline, resulting in a remarkably versatile group of graduates capable of giving a historical sermon in Latin while adorned with the finest fashions and whitest teeth in all of Texas. Employers took note, and Baylor graduates were in great demand.
Little did the students at that time, however, know of all that was to come-- the triumphs of the equestrian squad, the hosting of the NBA all-star game, and the marvel of Practice Court among the feats they could not imagine.
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Prof. Osler,
I’m so glad you brought up the Nazi story, because it reminded me of the story of when President Brooks and the Board of Intenders erroneously believed that a group of faculty was forming an armed Mormon battalion. Here’s what I know:
Not only did faculty then have to teach all of the classes you mentioned, but also the members of the faculty doubled as the custodial staff. The Latin teachers were responsible for trimming hedges and other ground work. The history and rhetoric teachers scrubbed floors and other such indoor duties. And the dentistry and fashion merchandising had to tend to the outhouses—until the introduction of electricity to Baylor in 1925, which allowed the University to use indoor plumbing for indoor bathrooms.
[Side note: we aren’t sure why the chores of the outhouse went to the dentistry and fashion merchandising faculty, but we do know that they were formerly also responsible for carrying the water for the student body’s weekly Saturday night bath. That might explain it].
Anyway, all of this work made the faculty particularly irritable, and to wind down after a tough day of teaching and cleaning (or whatnot), members of the faculty would meet at the home of Woodrow “The Human Windmill” Harrington, a well known fighter from the ‘teens who taught fashion merchandising. They rotated games, but generally everyone agreed to play either Canasta or Euchre. Some of the late-night sessions could get mighty violent, and Harrington was known for firing his shotgun into the air to calm down some of those with flaring tempers. Moreover, because there were female faculty members present, rumors of “other” activities spread.
The Board of Intenders got wind of this and employed Rutherford George, a student reporter, to investigate what happened at Harrington’s house. George showed up at the house on an evening when the faculty members were disagreeing more loudly than normal. Half of those in attendance agreed to play Euchre, but several of them demanded an evening of Oh Hell. George knelt outside a window in a state of horror, hearing the sounds of Oh Hell and knowing that the game was also known as Mormon Bridge. And at one point, Arthur John Lilley, a second cousin of our current president, was discovered to be hiding Jacks of hearts and diamonds up his sleeve while playing a game of Euchre, which caused a major riot in the house and which led to a series of threats against Lilley’s life and property. This led Harrington to run out to grab his gun.
This was all that George could take, for he ran as fast as he could and went to speak with President Brooks, who was then recovering from his gender-defining surgery (we are quite sure he chose male), and Board chair Ray Charles “Sleepy” Monroe, a cola executive. In this mess, all that Brooks and Monroe could decipher from George’s message was that the faculty was playing Mormon games and taking up arms.
Visibly angered, they instructed George to go back to confront Harrington directly. The conversation is believed to have gone as follows:
George: “Is it true that you invite female faculty to your meetings?”
Harrington: “It is indeed true, but we engage in no congress with these faculty. Some of them are the best Canasta players in Texas.”
George: “You have a Congress? Since when does the faculty have a Congress?”
Harrington: “We don’t! We just meet in the house!”
George: “You hold your Congress in the house?”
Harrington: “No! We meet in the house! And we just SIT IN IT!”
George: “You have a Senate?”
Harrington: “Argh! No! We don’t do anything! Now get out of here!”
The headline of the Baylor newspaper the next day said it all: “Baylor Faculty House and Senate Meet, Do Nothing.” Once Brooks and Monroe read this and engaged in a long deliberation, they agreed to allow the faculty to have a Senate, so long as it continued to do nothing. And thus, faculty governance at Baylor was born.
The story of poor Rutherford George isn’t quite so happy, for he became a drunkard, spending the rest of his days walking aimlessly around the perimeter surrounding the Baylor campus. But George’s name became memorialized when a prospective bar owner saw George making his rounds on a number of occasions and hearing the inebriated former student talking about making one more “big O” around campus. I think you know the rest.
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I’m so glad you brought up the Nazi story, because it reminded me of the story of when President Brooks and the Board of Intenders erroneously believed that a group of faculty was forming an armed Mormon battalion. Here’s what I know:
Not only did faculty then have to teach all of the classes you mentioned, but also the members of the faculty doubled as the custodial staff. The Latin teachers were responsible for trimming hedges and other ground work. The history and rhetoric teachers scrubbed floors and other such indoor duties. And the dentistry and fashion merchandising had to tend to the outhouses—until the introduction of electricity to Baylor in 1925, which allowed the University to use indoor plumbing for indoor bathrooms.
[Side note: we aren’t sure why the chores of the outhouse went to the dentistry and fashion merchandising faculty, but we do know that they were formerly also responsible for carrying the water for the student body’s weekly Saturday night bath. That might explain it].
Anyway, all of this work made the faculty particularly irritable, and to wind down after a tough day of teaching and cleaning (or whatnot), members of the faculty would meet at the home of Woodrow “The Human Windmill” Harrington, a well known fighter from the ‘teens who taught fashion merchandising. They rotated games, but generally everyone agreed to play either Canasta or Euchre. Some of the late-night sessions could get mighty violent, and Harrington was known for firing his shotgun into the air to calm down some of those with flaring tempers. Moreover, because there were female faculty members present, rumors of “other” activities spread.
The Board of Intenders got wind of this and employed Rutherford George, a student reporter, to investigate what happened at Harrington’s house. George showed up at the house on an evening when the faculty members were disagreeing more loudly than normal. Half of those in attendance agreed to play Euchre, but several of them demanded an evening of Oh Hell. George knelt outside a window in a state of horror, hearing the sounds of Oh Hell and knowing that the game was also known as Mormon Bridge. And at one point, Arthur John Lilley, a second cousin of our current president, was discovered to be hiding Jacks of hearts and diamonds up his sleeve while playing a game of Euchre, which caused a major riot in the house and which led to a series of threats against Lilley’s life and property. This led Harrington to run out to grab his gun.
This was all that George could take, for he ran as fast as he could and went to speak with President Brooks, who was then recovering from his gender-defining surgery (we are quite sure he chose male), and Board chair Ray Charles “Sleepy” Monroe, a cola executive. In this mess, all that Brooks and Monroe could decipher from George’s message was that the faculty was playing Mormon games and taking up arms.
Visibly angered, they instructed George to go back to confront Harrington directly. The conversation is believed to have gone as follows:
George: “Is it true that you invite female faculty to your meetings?”
Harrington: “It is indeed true, but we engage in no congress with these faculty. Some of them are the best Canasta players in Texas.”
George: “You have a Congress? Since when does the faculty have a Congress?”
Harrington: “We don’t! We just meet in the house!”
George: “You hold your Congress in the house?”
Harrington: “No! We meet in the house! And we just SIT IN IT!”
George: “You have a Senate?”
Harrington: “Argh! No! We don’t do anything! Now get out of here!”
The headline of the Baylor newspaper the next day said it all: “Baylor Faculty House and Senate Meet, Do Nothing.” Once Brooks and Monroe read this and engaged in a long deliberation, they agreed to allow the faculty to have a Senate, so long as it continued to do nothing. And thus, faculty governance at Baylor was born.
The story of poor Rutherford George isn’t quite so happy, for he became a drunkard, spending the rest of his days walking aimlessly around the perimeter surrounding the Baylor campus. But George’s name became memorialized when a prospective bar owner saw George making his rounds on a number of occasions and hearing the inebriated former student talking about making one more “big O” around campus. I think you know the rest.
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