University of California Berkeley - Blue and Gold Yearbook (Berkeley, CA)

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lue and Inter-Class Courtesies Throughout the year the hostility of the two lower classes flared out in countless ways. It did not need to be a stated conflict. It could be a simple passing on the path. It was a continuous feud, ready to break out in violence at the least provocation. A class meeting, for instance, was always the signal for a disturbance, and the opposing class would see to it that the gathering was broken up if doors had to be wrenched from their hinges, windows smashed, and even the fire hose brought into play. A freshman indulging in a forbidden privilege always made himself a storm center. Once a freshman took a cane and a co-ed to church on a Sunday evening. The sight of the sophomore emblem (the cane, of course) in the hands of the freshman caused a riot that disturbed the quiet of the Sabbath evening and scandalized the community as well as the luckless freshman ' s fair escort. The numerals of a rival class always acted as a red rag. The baseball backstop, private fences and even Goat Island have borne class numbers and have received the brunt of interclass collisions in consequence. Slue and Gold, j Out of class rivalry and the union of common interests grew a few traditional celebrations. These have been tolerated and encouraged or doggedly opposed according as the fires of class rivalry burned fresh or burned low. The freshmen and sophomores, under these conditions, did not concern themselves much with carrying out any elaborate class festivities. The most they hoped to do was to get through their dances, the freshie glee and the sophomore hop, without having the electric light wires cut and the gymnasium left in Stygian darkness and rank confusion, or having the merry-makers further disturbed by such annoyances as flour throwing or the presence of rats and, possibly, limburger cheese. Many a lower class dance has been concluded at a late hour under the glancing beams of a few locomotive headlights and a few tallow candles, all because class spirit took it as a matter of course that nothing creditable should be allowed to emanate from the rival body. In later years the sophomore class has taken upon itself the duty of getting up a minstrel show or a circus, in which all the vaudeville talent of the class and college could have an opportunity to present itself. Largely because these celebrations took on a larger aspect than mere class enterprises, they always have been immune from attack. In one sense, such a change of spirit is worthy of note, since it marks that break down 26 Commencement-.

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As a rule freshmen managed to carry out some sort of a march through the streets was always enlivened by unexpected attacks. The high priests on the wagon were lassoed from their perches and dragged into the street, to have their shoes removed and their persons handcuffed to telegraph poles. The transparencies soon disappeared in a similar fashion. Often wire stretched across the street stopped the hearse and wire-cutters were called into play, while swarms of sophomores surged over the beleaguered procession of mourners. This was always a good time to unhitch the horses and loosen the wagon wheels. A drenching from fire hoses was also a favorite expedient. The entrance to the campus was a great place for trouble. One class stopped the Dana Street entrance with a water wagon, whose wheels had been removed. Then, to clinch matters, the College Avenue entrance was blockaded, while the frenzied sophomores attempted to chop down the bridge. In the end the freshmen drove back their foes and won the campus, arriving in a most undignified fashion for a funeral train. The pageant closed in the middle of the campus with a final burst of rhetoric from program. The TJ i . I -Tet armi s. Blue end fllue and Gold, 187% such pontifical dignitaries as were left on the hearse. The coffin was brought out and the Damnator applied his choicest invectives on the mass of the completed text- books. While the flames licked up the hated Bourdon and Minto, the Laudator sung the praises of the f reshmen and the Vituperator heaped obloquy on the sophomores, whom the spare priests and mourners were busily tying up. Time-honored custom reserved for the speech-making the choicest compliments of the disgruntled sophomores, and the aspiring orators of the freshman class had to do their best amid a constant shower of very ancien.t eggs. With all available sophomores safely tied up and reposing about the wheels of the wagon, the Bourdon celebration generally came to a close. Rushing is pretty nearly a defunct custom. It got its death-blow in 1897 when a freshman received a distressing injury in a skirmish with sophomores. The revulsion of a new tradition : and California has never taken kindly to hand-made customs, ever since, we have been witnessing the slow death of the old tradition. In its departure rushing has robbed Charter Day of a lively feature, and has taken the life out of a Bourdon celebration. A burial without opposition is too tame. Like the Irish wake, a little fighting gives the funeral some zest and compensates for the bother and expense. When rushing was interdicted, some of the classes tried to turn the Bourdon into a college custom, purely spectacular. But it was the manufacture of a ne T tradition : and California has never taken kindly to hand-made customs- After one or two distressing attempts to remodel this end-of-the-term celebration, the Bourdon burial has finally passed into history. 25 Class Pilgrimage

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of class spirit for the broader college spirit, mention of which has already been made. These minstrel shows have combined the purely vaudeville and chorus features of the old black-face show with the higher qualities of a dramatic entertainment. The circus drew into itself not only all the class talent, but the best that could be furnished by the rest of the college and even by the courtesy of professional performers. They were both innovations and were worthy of encouragement. The enormous labor involved and the uncertainty of the venture from a financial point of view have made a number of classes chary about perpetuating the custom. One of the most interesting and valuable interclass activities, that in recent years has suffered a noticeable decline, is the freshman-sophomore field day. It cannot be said that interest in track athletics is dying out, although it may be reasonably ques- tioned whether enthusiasm for this form of sport has grown with the same pace as the popularity of other games. It is undoubtedly true that the main cause of the lack of interest in an interclass field day is the dying of class spirit a factor in these contests which made every race and every contest on the cinder path a matter of the deepest concern and keenest rivalry. The loss of class spirit is responsible in a great measure for the abandonment of interclass baseball and football games contests which always attracted a large crowd and a tense one. With the disappearance of these athletic contests, also disappeared a whole host of scrub games, which formerly added much to the life of the college. These were matches between the different engineering colleges, between the college newspa- per staffs and between the fraternities. True We have an occasional faculty Skull and Keys baseball match on a holiday and once in a while the glee club and football team cross bats in a costume game, where more consideration is given to a laughable situa- tion than to a double play. In passing, it may be well to remind the present generation that the greatest changes have come into track athletics, the number of events being eliminated and thus restricting the field of competition to a few performers. Field days a few years ago had such strange events as three-legged races, record runs to Grizzly Peak and back again, the high kick, the pole vault for distance, the standing high and broad jumps, throwing the fifty-six pound weight, the baseball throw, walking matches, tug-of-war matches and bicycle races. With such a wide field to choose from it was very easy for all able-bodied students to participate in some form of track contest. Junior and Senior Dignity Junior Day, the one great traditional day celebration of the third-year class, is a nctive case of a class holiday which has come to be a university affair with no trace of class rivalry in it other than the friendly emulation which characterizes most college activities. Junior Day formerly was a rather tame affair, built on the plan of a high school ' s graduating exercises. Music, speeches and essays were the great features. Then a dramatic element was introduced in the form of a rollicking burlesque. Later this theatrical portion of the program became the most important and overshadowed the literary features. Today the Junior Day program consists of a farce of three acts preceded by a curtain raiser and the class president ' s speech. Some of the student plays presented in recent years have been exceptional pieces of work. One of these scored a tremendous hit when given on Junior Day to a large undergraduate audience. Since then it has received a favorable reception on the professional stage. The Junior ' prom is the grand class dance which winds up Junior Day festivities. Often the -spending juniors make this the most elaborate college dance of the year. Commencement Week has always been the great senior celebration, but only in recent years has it had a complete program of festivities. The earlier Class Days and Com- mencement Days were simple affairs, the one persistent feature in all these affairs being the everlasting essay and oration. Even Class Day had a highly serious motive : for the morning exercises were ponderous affairs with senior addresses on problems that were oppressive. The afternoon exercises were held under the oaks, and consisted of the famous trio of class history, prophecy and dispensation. The latter on many occasions caused weeping and wailing, for the dispensator read the class will and publicly pre- sented his class-mates with gifts that were anything but conventional flattery. On this basis the future elaborate afternoon exercises have been built. Ten years or more ago the Class Days commenced to grow in importance. Ivy and tree plantings took place in the oak grove and a band concert started the day. In the afternoon the class pilgrimage was made, and all the buildings and places of interest were revisited by the class in a body, appropriate speeches being made by representa- tive speakers at each important spot. The day closed with a picturesque promenade con- cert in Lovers ' Lane which in those days had a romantic seclusion it certainly lacks 27 Senior Extravaganza ue end