quote:

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Teammates voted Ty Branyon as their “Heart” this season, and it exemplifies what you’ve heard us coaches and the players talk about all season – the unselfish and unified spirit of this team. Here’s a young man who walked on at Texas A&M out of his love for what the University stands for in terms of the Aggie family and values, inspired he said by Bonfire, and because he desired to play Division I football.

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Chad Schroeder-

quote:

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"I never got to go to Bonfire, and when we went out to a ranch and ate dinner as a team and built a little campfire in remembrance of Aggie Bonfire, it was something that I will never forget for the rest of my life. I know now why so many Aggies are pro bonfire coming back. It's definitely not just about stacking longs and burning a fire; it’s about something much greater.

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from the Friday with Fran article...





[This message has been edited by WaltonLoads08 (edited 12/15/2006 10:39p).]

amen chad

new army loves to talk about Ol' Army Bonfire...

But then again, I guess that's better than forgetting about Bonfire, even though, they could never understand it.

ttt... for Bonfire....

So "new army" can't understand Bonfire? Sorry I didn't work on it and can't "understand" it. I really never paid attention to the stories from my dad (Moses Hall Crew Chief) and never really cared about any of those Bonfires I attended every year from '86 to '98. And I didn't feel any sadness in '99 and didn't see a tear in my dad's eye. I guess I'll never understand.

No need to be sarcastic about the tragedy buddy.

Yes,

quote:

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"new army" can't understand Bonfire

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It was more than your dad's stories, and watching it burn. If it was just that, half the frat daddies that went to A&M get it picture perfect. But that isn't the case.

That said, Gig'em Chad & Ty, & the rest of A&M Football, and the Spirit of what was Aggie Bonfire.

I think new students that go out to off campus bonfire can get the feel of what old bonfire was. My dad was a red and ive been to many on campus burns. My brother was suppose to be at stack the night it fell, but because a alarm was set wrong was not. I have worked off campus bonfire since coming here and i believe i have a pretty good idea what it is about. So i dont think you can tell me i dont.

pro bonfire... rebuild the spirit

quote:

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aggiebird02
posted 12:30a, 12/16/06



new army loves to talk about Ol' Army Bonfire...

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once again, this is /Torbush wow

'09, unfortunately you may have to get use to selfish people like this who seem to have not gotten a clue for the past few years

www.studentbonfire.com

they seem to want to keep Bonfire for themselves, and tell Student Bonfire workers they don't have the same spirit, which is what Bonfire has always been about, not where it is located.

oh, and don't worry... he's c/o '02, you've probably worked on more Bonfire than he has... so im not sure why he's so high and mighty, his pants are probably still sticky from the virgin stripe..

Some currernt and former students never did get the chance to participate in an on campus Bonfire. I am one of them and I wish I could have. But for you to go and say that I don't understand what Bonfire is is completely ludicris. I worked on the student Bonfire every year (including the Unity Project it's first year). I went with the Moses crews.

For you to sit on your high horse and proclaim that what I worked on was not Bonfire is assinine. Someone claiming to understand what "real" Bonfire is a bit ironic. If you truely understand, then you would know that Bonfire is about working your rear end off and forging life long friendships with those working along side you. It is about a very large group of people coming together as one to achieve a common goal. You would also understand that where the Bonfire is built and burned is merely a formality.

I wish I could've seen Bonfire on campus. Unfortunately I wasn't able to. But that does not mean that the Bonfires I worked on are any different or any less meaningful than the one's you worked on (if indeed you did work on some).

Unfortunately there are many other old Ags with your same opinion about the current Bonfire issue (and by the way being class of 02 does not make you an old Ag). Current Bonfires might not be as big as they once were and they might not be built/burned on the polo fields but they are not in any way inferior to Bonfires of the past.

I strongly believe that if some of the critics of current Bonfire would go out and work along side the student/former students, they would see the passion and dedication those working have for Bonfire. I urge you to do so and then tell us if you still have the same opinion. You might and that is fine. But maybe after seeing the passion and dedication of all the workers, you might not be so quick to scoff at them.

You were lucky enough to experience Bonfire on campus. Others, including myself, were not so lucky. However, that does not give you grounds to belittle some thing that I and many others love so much.

To all the people who still work on or are still passionate about Bonfire: Don't let these blowhards dampen your spirits and Build the Hell Outta Bonfire.

WALTON LOADS!

LTHOT!!!
BIIR!

quote:

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aggiebird02
posted 12:33a, 12/16/06



But then again, I guess that's better than forgetting about Bonfire, even though, they could never understand it.

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i still can't believe this was said... i hope this is some kind of troll, but trolling about something like Bonfire is bad bull IMO

While I am not saying you don't understand Bonfire, I can see why many ol Ags cannot equate the two and its not selfishness.

Until you have the enitre campus buzzing, until you get 80,000 people there. Until you get the t-sips coming because, in their opinion, its the best thing ever. Until you hear the band march in. Untill you have the players and coaches there, until you have the yell leaders. Until it is back on campus. It won't be the same.

I applaud the students trying and I have no doubt you are getting the essence of what Bonfire means and why it was done. Hopefully one day it can come back to what it was.

That being said, a large number of Ags just showed up to watch it brun back in the day anyway. So ol Army can't throw stones.

quote:

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Until it is back on campus. It won't be the same.

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i feel like this is pretty obvious, and no one is claiming it to be "the same"... but what IS selfish and bad bull is to tell us that current Bonfire workers do not have the Aggie Spirit and cannot understand what Bonfire means.

I am glad you felt it was obvious. Many others do not.

BTW, what people like Aggiebird are saying is no different than Ol Ags telling current ags that they are getting the essence of A&M because it has changed too much. No different.

[This message has been edited by Federale01 (edited 12/16/2006 11:59a).]

I can't believe I have remained silent on this issue for all these years........

Current students who work on "Off Campus student bonfire" do achieve many of the same things that those of us who worked on Aggie Bonfire did. However, "Off Campus sudent bonfire" will never be Aggie Bonfire and the two are different.

I will respect your right to work, build and burn the "Off-Campus student bonfire" but please respect my right to not acknowledge your project as equivalent or even a replacement for Aggie Bonfire.

If you believe that the feelings, emotions, and end results of your bonfire are the same as those who built and bleed and sacrificed for Aggie Bonfire, then perhaps you don't truely understand Bonfire.

If however, you acknowledge that the old tradition of Aggie Bonfire is not available to you and that you wish to fill the void with something similiar, then I'm sure you DO UNDERSTAND.

Getting up every non football week-end and loading flatbed trucks in the cold and dark to be transported for cutting.... working on stack behind Duncan 24 hours a day.... and then hearing the band play as it burned........ listening to the coach...... seeing the football team gathered..... having the yell leaders lead thousands upon tens of thousands who gathered is a gift that I wish my son and daughters could have ....... but it isn't - at least not at present. That doesn't mean that different memories are not just as precious ...... but they are different.

I am so happy that I at least had the opportunity to have children experience Aggie Bonfire with me........ and that they were old enough to experience the horrific and healing experiences that accompanied the end of Aggie Bonfire.

In my heart I believe that the "Off-Campus student bonfire" - as well meaning as it is - will be the major obstacle to bringing back Aggie Bonfire that unites the Aggie community again. Because for all the good that the "Off Campus student bonfire" does, the one thing it does NOT DO....... and more than likely can never do........ is unify AGGIES.

There are too many, young and old, Ol' Army and new, that see the current bonfire as simply "a burning of sticks" and something that our hearts will not allow us to support because, for us, it is not Aggie Bonfire and Aggie Bonfire still burns in our souls forever!


Again, I'll respect your right to enjoy your bonfire...... and I'll ackowledge that some may understand the differences between a bonfire and Aggie Bonfire...... but I ask that you respect our memories as well....... and not try to automatically claim them. If you don't understand what we felt for Aggie Bonfire that in no way demeans you....... it simply means that you didn't experience it. AND, even though you didn't experience it or understand AGGIE BONFIRE the way we did, doesn't mean that WE believe that the loss of the AGGIE BONFIRE is in any way less painful to you than it is to us.........

AGGIES DON'T LIE, CHEAT OR STEAL AND ALL AGGIES KNOW THE PAIN OF THE LOSS OF AGGIE BONFIRE!!!!

Roses, its attitudes like yours that keep SB from being a unifying force. IT could be, and will be someday, but only when people like you stop this non-sense of railing against it, making outlandish claims and bad mouthing us in general. YOU spread disharmony far more than we ever have. Everytime an old ag steps up and bad mouths SB, or starts this "not real aggies not real bonfire etc. etc.", you just widen the gap that forms over bonfire between current sudents.

Stop trying to take what we have left away from us, stop trying to cause divides in the student body. Stop walking around acting like your a bonified judge of all that is morality and tradition.

This attitude that alot of ags have taken about bonfire, and traditions in general, is sickening to me. I gre up coming to CS every year, I grew up being taught tradition, being taught thatbeing an aggie was about a comaradery and sense of tradition unparalelled almost anywere. When I come on this board, and see old ags like roses speaking, I wonder were in the hell that vision that my mother taught me.....

____________________________________________________________
Proudest member of the Fightin Texas Aggie class of 08 Beat the h*** outa tu A-A-A Whoop!!!. May bonfire forever burn in our hearts.....and may the Twelfth Man ever burn it in memory and in hope for the future.



[This message has been edited by Ag_of_08 (edited 12/16/2006 1:00p).]

What the hell does it matter what Ol Ags think about anything going on on campus. We can't sow division in the student body. Quit trying such an illogical arguement.

What these people are trying to say is there was something unique about what Bonfire was. It was walking with you buddies from you outfit or dorm out to Push. It was yelling at non-regs when you are walking back to your dorm. It was being on the third stack and staring out across the campus during a sunset.

It was all this and more. No one on here is saying you are non-Aggies or have no spirit.
They are just saying what they had cannot be replaced by something off campus.

I understand that you see that as an attack on what you do and that you think it belittles your efforts. But that is their opinion and it shouldn't offend you.

quote:

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What the hell does it matter what Ol Ags think about anything going on on campus. We can't sow division in the student body. Quit trying such an illogical arguement.

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You havent spent much time on campus lately have you?

The entire argument AGAINST SB, and bonfire in general, is being based on what old ags are saying.

Regardless, I'm done. This kind of crap makes me so mad i cant see straight...

____________________________________________________________
Proudest member of the Fightin Texas Aggie class of 08 Beat the h*** outa tu A-A-A Whoop!!!. May bonfire forever burn in our hearts.....and may the Twelfth Man ever burn it in memory and in hope for the future.

It's not like Bonfire was a religious experience or anything. Students today who join together to build bonfire are experiencing the same stuff those of us did prior to '99. Just because it happened to be near Duncan or on the Polo Fields did not make it somehow more "sacred". Since they are forbidden from building it on campus, they are doing it where they can.

quote:

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they seem to want to keep Bonfire for themselves, and tell Student Bonfire workers they don't have the same spirit, which is what Bonfire has always been about, not where it is located.

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Ouch!

A good 'ol condescending Old Army b*tch slap!

08,

You were obviously never in the corps and had to listen to Ol Ags tell you at every reunion or game that you aren't getting the same thing they got out of it. It upset me, so I understand what you are saying. I got the same basic stuff out of the corps so why listen to this crap. But it was different for them. I understood that and accepted it. I was quite happy from my corps expierence so I didn't care after hearing it a few times.

ATmag,

Agreed, but what if A&M banned football from campus and Students decide to go play an intramural game down in Navasota.

ABout 10 thousand people show up. There are no yell leaders, no band, no marchin in.... Who would be arguing its the same? I think that is all these posters are trying to say. Sure, they will be doing a great thing, having fun and building a new tradition that looks a lot like the old one, but it shouldn't surprise anybody when people say it is not the same.

i'm crazy redass but have never made it to student bonfire

Federale01,

I think your analogy is flawed. Here, everybody is talking about Bonfire being more than a pile of sticks burning. It’s about the hard work, camaraderie, etc. That stuff (I assume) is the same with this bonfire as it was with our bonfire. If it was just about a pile of sticks, then I would agree with you. Our pile of sticks was larger and more impressive than their pile of sticks. Of course, my dad’s pile of sticks was a hell of a lot more impressive then ours.

BTW, you 01'ers don’t know the meaning of the word, “smoked”. Just FYI.

I know a thing or two about what it was like. None of my favorite memories are from burn. Though it was one hell of a party - it doesn't compare to the time spent loading trucks (WHOOP!), defending your perimiter pole, swamping logs or at stack.
Those who have been involved know why this is - because of the time spent with your buddies.
I'm sure its the same way today.

Atm,

I agree but football at A&M is more than watching a game to me. Its about meeting ol Ags, its about tailgating with friends, its about people returning to campus, its the 12th Man standing and yelling for one thing, its the festive atmosphere, etc. So I like my analogy.

And "smoking". I will gladly leave that definition in your hands, I have no issue with me not knowing that. If it was worse for you than for me, it must have sucked hard.

Yeah, but moving Bonfire off campus only changed the activities related to it burning. So yeah, the coach doesn't speak there anymore, and the band may not be present, but all the other stuff is the same. If you read all the "old ag" explanations of their experience at Bonfire, they talk about building it, not burning it. So its nowhere near as drastic as moving A&M football games.

For the Student Bonfire! The intent to keep the Bonfire tradition is there, the hard work is there = Aggies pulling for each other!

I helped build 4 of them. My outfit unloaded the flatbed trucks Walton loaded. The best part of Bonfire was the building, not the burning. The OC Bonfire isn't the same: BUT, and I repeat: BUT the OC Bonfire is keeping the Spirit of Bonfire alive, so if and when it ever comes back to campus there will be students who can pass that spirit on to other Aggies. The current students are doing what they can, and I applaud the effort. And yes, I am Old Army.