May 4, 2005

Yale searches for a new mascot

From Sports Illustrated:

"Back in 1889 when Yale students wanted an animal to symbolize their football team's grit and pluck, the process was simple: One of them bought a bulldog for five dollars from a local blacksmith. Handsome Dan, they called the fierce little creature, and a tradition was born. But when Handsome Dan XV died of a possible heart attack last January after nine years on the job, finding a suitable replacement for America's longest-running live-animal mascot was not easy. First, came a press release, followed by stories in newspapers and on radio about the school's search for canine candidates, as the release put it, "athletic enough to climb stairs, walk the sidelines of a game for four quarters and dodge out-of-bounds football players." Then Steve Conn, Yale's director of sports publicity, evaluated essays and photos from 40 applicants, and enlisted Chris Getman, Handsome Dan XV's caretaker, to help him winnow the field to 10. On April 26, as the Yale Precision Marching Band played How Much Is that Doggie in the Window and several hundred spectators gathered on the New Haven, Conn., campus to watch, the finalists competed to become -- with apologies to Georgia's UGA -- college sports' boss bulldog."

Read the article...

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