quote:

---

The first play-by-play live radio broadcast of a college football game was WTAW's broadcast of the 1921 contest between Texas A&M and t.u.

---

OK, I knew Dave South had been around for a while, but wow! Almost 100 years.

Explains a lot.

quote:

---

quote:

---

As one who lived in Puryear circa 1969-70, yep the Playboys added a shiny bunny to the dome along with the fish class year for several years.

---

WHERE???

---

It was faintly visible when I left in '94. It was around the back of the dome facing Harrington - the SE corner? To me it looked painted rather than polished. I was on campus in '97, but can't recall if the bunny was still visible. I was on campus last in 2013. The Bunny was no longer visible in 2013.

It was there and visible when I was on campus. Circa 2003

quote:

---

Just a thought....

Has anyone thought about filing an open records request for a map (and/or other information) of the steam tunnels? I've always wondered the truth vs. myth behind what goes where and such. I don't know if they would consider this information vital to protecting the infrastructure or is truly releasable. I've only been trained in FOIA from the viewpoint of a police officer...

"Its not fair that the old farts got to see them and we don't".

---

Tour of the steam tunnels:

quote:

---

The first play-by-play live radio broadcast of a college football game was WTAW's broadcast of the 1921 contest between Texas A&M and t.u., which resulted in a scoreless tie.

Near the current site of the Texas A&M Foundation once stood as many as 50 "project houses." In the depths of the Great Depression in 1930s, students lived in the houses, doing their own cooking and cleaning, buying groceries wholesale, and providing their own chickens and livestock for food.

Fifty-three live oak trees were planted around Simpson Drill Field in 1920 in memory of Aggies killed in World War I.

---

Not sure these three are correct.

First play-by-play. Actually, the broadcast was made on Thursday (Thanksgiving Day), November 24, 1921 from Kyle Field in College Station, Texas by amateur radio station 5XB. Not WTAW - a commercial radio station

55 trees, like the 55 flags, were planted for the WWI dead.

quote:

---

Not sure these three are correct.

55 trees, like the 55 flags, were planted for the WWI dead.

---

In my day, they claimed 52 (I thought) killed in WWI. A few years later in changed to 55. I always assumed it was because 3 (or 2) new names were discovered.

And as far as the steam tunnel video, I'm amazed at how many classes after mine went down there. There were darn few of us dumb enough to go down there in my day, and I figured it only got more restrictive and prosecuted after that time.

The video scares me, the confined spaces, electrical, steam.

But 40 years ago, I was indestructible, so......

The Bunny exists (at least it did back in the day)!

Ramp 7 - Poo-ah!!!

I had the privilege of easing my way out the 4th floor bathroom window on the east side, onto the 4th floor ledge of the Academic Building, while it was raining, and carefully scootching my way around to the portico on the west side, then up and over and onto the roof, where we entered a door at the base of the pedestal upon which the dome sits, whereupon we entered into the space between the outer dome and the inner ceiling and opened a door Into the rotunda that could only be opened from inside the dome area to allow some less courageous (perhaps less stupid) Puryear boys in. We all scratched our names and class years in the paint and were pleased to note other graffiti from as far back as WW 1. This was at the end of the 1988 spring semester with a couple of other RAs from Puryear. Good times. If my kids did it, I'd kill them.

quote:

---

quote:

---

I always heard A&M had a rifle for every student..... Never believed it, though....

---

Up until the early 1970s, the Corps dorms had armories in every dorm. Held rifles that were used for drill. I know they were used in 1970, but by the time I got there in 1973, they were gone.

RVs and FDT use de-milled '03 Springfields. I have no idea what the drill rifles were, or if they were working examples.

Look on the Cushing Library Flickr page, and you'll see pre-WWII cadets firing cannon, mortars, machine guns, etc.

---

I remember back in the 70's that there used to be a section underneath the student side of Kyle Field that was set up as a shooting range.

After finals circa 1974, a friend and I entered Kyle Field and noticed something odd on the press (west) side. The current stands, at that day, were constructed over the original (?) or earlier stands. You could go to the top of the first tier and see the gap and bottom section. You could also climb down if skinny enough and climb around on the old stadium section under the then used stadium section.

JFS;
I had firing practice under the east side stands as you say. We did march with Springfields 1903 models for FDT.

These are great!

I took marksmanship for credit under the stands in 1985. It was only pellet rifles but the range was there. Mount Aggie (snow skiing) was across the street between the stands and the President's House then.

This was an amazing thread to read.

quote:

---

Any haunted buildings on campus? Anyone ever see one? (a ghost not a haunted building). I've heard one of the libraries is supposed to be haunted.

---

It was pretty well known by those who worked in the video lab underneath the west side of Kyle field (pre renovation) that there was a ghost that would cut off lights and wander the hallways. I understand that its presence was so unnerving that some of the staff set up cameras to try to catch it on tape.

By the way, Tip was a small black and white dog. There is a picture of the dog with the Juniors of C Company Infantry in the Fall of 1948 in the bottom right of the Reveille case in the Corps Center. The dog is identified as Tip in the photo. Tip was killed when it was hit by a car; it was subsequently buried on the Quad near Dorm 10 as previously stated.

quote:

---

quote:

---

I always heard A&M had a rifle for every student..... Never believed it, though....

---

Up until the early 1970s, the Corps dorms had armories in every dorm. Held rifles that were used for drill. I know they were used in 1970, but by the time I got there in 1973, they were gone.

RVs and FDT use de-milled '03 Springfields. I have no idea what the drill rifles were, or if they were working examples.

Look on the Cushing Library Flickr page, and you'll see pre-WWII cadets firing cannon, mortars, machine guns, etc.

---

Canyon,

We (Army Cadets) drilled with M-1 (real) rifles in my era (1965-1969). Rifle drills started in the Spring and finished with a big 4th Army review & inspection. One of my buddies was playing with his rifle in his hole & dropped it cracking the stock. Another buddies Dad secured a replacement stock from Ft. Sam in SA. Another buddy forgot to get his rifle checked in before leaving the dorm after a drill. He sat 1hr sign ins for several week ends! You had to have your assigned rifle serial number memorized, too. Many thumbs smashed in learning to do the inspection presentation!

There's been a snake in the grass on campus for decades. You can see it under the bucking horse on the weathervane over the greenhouses.

Those greenhouses are gone but the snake in the grass has adorned the TAES Annex since at least 1987.

In the 70's the Army cadets used M-14 with blanks on FTX during weekends during our junior year to prepare us for Army summer training between our junior and senior years. We always had to clean them after the exercises and those dat gum blanks sure fouled those weapons. The weapons were kept in the Trigon arms room and there was not one per cadet, just enough for the juniors to use to get ready for summer camp.

quote:

---

Earlier someone mentioned how difficult it was for the demolition crew to destroy Guion Hall. Below is a photo of Guion Hall still clinging to its existence after an extended battle with the wrecking ball...I heard a larger wrecking ball had to be used - the first wrecking ball merely bounced off the walls like a tennis ball. This building (which along with Sbisa anchored Military Walk) just didn't want to disappear.







[This message has been edited by Old Main (edited 1/30/2013 2:22p).]

---

We used to watch "Tiger Flicks" (ie Military documentaries etc) in Guion Hall on Saturday mornings when the weather was too bad for drill practice (mid- 1960's). Always used to pray for rain on Saturdays. Also, the night of Nov 22, 1963 (the day JFK was assassinated), the whole Corps assembled in Guion, and it was announced that Bonfire for that year was cancelled (we were supposed to start collecting bonfire timbers the next day), and that all Corps members were excused to go back home until the following Monday. Needless to say, we didn't hang around any longer than necessary.

quote:

---

There was once a plan to consoliate A&M with tu and have one big campus. Glad that didn't get the votes. This was around 1903 or so.

---

The rest of the story is after the consolidation, the state was going to use the buildings at AMC for a black insane
asylum.

quote:

---

The cannon on the train is myth. The death of Cadet (Donald?) Sessums in a melee at a Baylor game in Waco in 1924 (or so) is fact. Lots of accusations and counter-accusations from that. The Texas A&M version is that a fight was pretty much expected when the game was played.

A car that had nearly run over Aggies a couple of years before was brought onto the field, Aggies rushed it, thinking the coeds on it were Baylor men (some things never change) and a fight ensued.

Aggies claim Baylor brought clubs to the game, Baylor says broken chairs were used. The Aggie Band played The National Anthem to stop the fight. Aggie claim is that senior cadet Sessums was clubbed after he snapped to attention and saluted.

He died a few days later. All athletic contests between the schools were suspended for four year.

I'm sure I've left out some details and got others wrong, but that should be enough to Google.

---

If I could wave my Magic Maroon Wand and make two things go away, they would be this story and squeezing.

This never happened. Like so many other Aggies I heard this story and was intrigued by it. Somewhere in the mid 80's I sat down in the board room of Aggie Park in SA with 6 or 8 Old Ag's from the 20's, most of which were at the game in question, and asked them about it. To a man they denied it ever happened.

They did raise some interesting points. Stealing artillery and commandeering a train are federal offenses, not good bull college pranks. You go to prison for years for such actions.

This would have been front page news all over the state. You won't find any mention of it in any Texas newspaper archives.

Just suppose it was true and some Aggies turned a howitzer loose on Baylor. That's called murder. If that happened there's a good chance there would be no Corps of Cadets and probably no Texas A&M. At the least, it would be a story we would have had to hang our heads in shame for the last 90 years.

The Old Ag's figured some of their buddies piled into a pickup with a .22 in the gun rack, headed to Waco and got stopped by a cop in Calvert. And the story began.

For A&M, it's alumni and friends to make any attempt to keep this story alive is embarrassing.

quote:

---

Why was the gun/howitzer buried that was discovered at bonfire cutting in '74 (I was actually there shortly after it was discovered)? It was restored and used at games, perhaps until just recently. I had assumed or had heard that getting rid of those guns and burying them in an unused field had something to do with the (alleged) incident in Waco.

---

Wow. You're adding 2+2 and getting 46 and 2/3. Logic out what you just said. Ags allegedly grab a cannon out of the armory, hijack a train, and head to Waco. Texas Rangers stop them, and then what?

"You boys take that cannon back to College Station and bury it, and we'll forget this all happened.."

Hardly. Texas Rangers, Military officers (who may have noticed a cannon gone missing), A&M and Baylor administration, train personnel, the media in the entire state of Texas, etc. etc, etc. were all involved, yet the only record we have of the event is an Aggie Urban Legend?

As for how the cannon ended up where it did, my guess is the carriage broke, and it was abandoned. Since it was on A&M property, and it would take a massive effort to get it, no one bothered. Eventually the people who lost it died, retired, moved to other schools, etc. etc.

Well, we'll agree to disagree. Knowing the animosity in Austin toward Aggieland, I find it beyond belief that such an incident would be swept under the rug. The sip-lead legislature was constantly looking for an excuse to shut off funding to A&M and bolster t.u. An incident where A&M was plotting open warfare following a riot would have been a perfect death penalty case.

quote:

---

Actually, there were two cannons and they were buried, not simply abandoned, and buried deeply. They were only discovered because of the torrential rains during bonfire cut which significantly deepened a small gully into a wide and deep arroyo, exposing them. They appeared to have been buried as a means of disposing them so that they could not be found or used again. They also are precisely the right age and era to fit the story.

I'm not arguing against the fact that the Waco story may be urban legend since I have little facts one way or the other. However, you're also speculating on why the cannons were there. You're also using today's likely public reactions in an attempt to disprove what supposedly happened almost 100 years ago.

Texas was much, much more "wild and wooly", even violent, back then, and politics was definitely crony politics. An event like that could well have been simply purposely covered up and largely forgotten. My great granddad (class of '81, by the way) supposedly killed three men in his life, was kicked out of A&M as a fish for cutting another student badly in a knife fight, but was never arrested or spent a minute in jail. His immunity was probably due to his dad being the largest landowner in their county.

In short, lack of present-day evidence of the Waco event does not equate to evidence that it didn't occur. I suspect that, as with most myths, there is probably a grain of truth behind the story. Perhaps the Aggies didn't commandeer the train, but simply loaded a cannon on the train. When law enforcement got wind of what was going on, perhaps they later stopped the train and forced the students to unload the cannon. If that happened, it's not the type of thing that would be newsworthy in any era, but would nevertheless have been an exciting event for all involved and could have been the genesis of the story.

---

You and I had this same conversation elsewhere a few years back. At this point we're just going to agree to disagree. Nice to see you can continue to do so without being disagreeable, or questioning anyone's ancestry or love for Texas A&M.

quote:

---

Actually, there were two cannons and they were buried, not simply abandoned, and buried deeply. They were only discovered because of the torrential rains during bonfire cut which significantly deepened a small gully into a wide and deep arroyo, exposing them. They appeared to have been buried as a means of disposing them so that they could not be found or used again. They also are precisely the right age and era to fit the story.

I'm not arguing against the fact that the Waco story may be urban legend since I have little facts one way or the other. However, you're also speculating on why the cannons were there. You're also using today's likely public reactions in an attempt to disprove what supposedly happened almost 100 years ago.

Texas was much, much more "wild and wooly", even violent, back then, and politics was definitely crony politics. An event like that could well have been simply purposely covered up and largely forgotten. My great granddad (class of '81, by the way) supposedly killed three men in his life, was kicked out of A&M as a fish for cutting another student badly in a knife fight, but was never arrested or spent a minute in jail. His immunity was probably due to his dad being the largest landowner in their county.

In short, lack of present-day evidence of the Waco event does not equate to evidence that it didn't occur. I suspect that, as with most myths, there is probably a grain of truth behind the story. Perhaps the Aggies didn't commandeer the train, but simply loaded a cannon on the train. When law enforcement got wind of what was going on, perhaps they later stopped the train and forced the students to unload the cannon. If that happened, it's not the type of thing that would be newsworthy in any era, but would nevertheless have been an exciting event for all involved and could have been the genesis of the story.

---

Check out this Baylor brawl reference from the 1951 Aggieland.

Reference the article from the '51 Aggieland. It looks like we can draw our own conclusions as to the events following the death of the cadet in Waco. I'd like to move on to something else mentioned.

I had the pleasure of knowing Colonel Stewart Hervey (SP?) '17. A WWI vet and a great Texas Aggie.
The last time I remember seeing him was at Muster in the 80's. He was setting up chairs with men 70
years his junior. I really enjoyed his stories of A&M prior to the Great War.

He told me the sentiment on campus was that before a real Texas Aggie would take off the Grey Uniform and put
on those stupid boots, they ought to burn the place down and give it back to the Indians.

I've always tried to keep that in mind when I hear discussions of "Old Army shot to hell" 'cause something is changed from the way it was.