Amherst College Vote: Mascot Name Receives 'Mammoth' Change. Amherst College changes name of mascot to an extinct Another argument is that the Jeff alienates students of Native American descent, whether they be current members of the community or prospective applicants. -as mascots go, different enough but not arcane, Image coutesy of Amherst College Archives and Special Collections, Mens Cross Country Places Second at Little Threes, Hussein Takes Title, Reaching a High Note with Musical Education, Football Remains Undefeated With Dominant Win Over Colby, Men's Tennis Doubles Pair of Revzin and Solimano Compete in South Carolina, An Unpredictable Road to Success at LinkedIn, Defying Definition, Embracing the Liberal Arts, Women's Cross Country Finishes Second at Little Three Championships, A Portraits Worth: Photographing, Storytelling and Listening, Good story nicknames/mascots "Sabrinas" absent. Amherst In February the Mascot Committee solicited the input of 441 student and alumni delegates highachieving - Yumpu What is the history behind the Lord Jeff and Amherst athletics? AMHERST (CBS/AP) Get ready to cheer for the In 1974, Dartmouths board of trustees issued an official statement in which they said that they found use of the (Indian) symbol in any form to be inconsistent with present institutional and academic objectives of the College in advancing Native American education. After this statement, the Indian was considered discontinued as a mascot, although it was never officially removed. You will Do well to try to Innoculate the Indians by means of Blankets, as well as to try Every other method that can serve to Extirpate this Execrable Race, Amherst wrote. But he said this is not a reason to avoid changing the mascot. In total, 9,295 Mascot The British Army used smallpox against Native Americans during the Siege of Fort Pitt in 1763. Call him goal-oriented: Amherst hockey prodigy Ryan Leonard likely a top 10 NHL Draft pick, Redevelopment of Village Barn Shops in Hadley may hinge on adoption of smart growth zoning, Overdose deaths decline in region in 2022, bucking state trend. 2023 FOX News Network, LLC. Who was able to submit mascot ideas? A student-run publication, the Lord Jeff, was started in June 1920 and ran until 1935. Let's face it, he was a lousy mascot thirty years ago and is a lousy mascot today, and shows a growing understanding of history to nix the nobleman. Bravo, Professor George! Hamster rhymes with gangsta, which could prove very useful. Why change from Lord Jeffs? Most Amherst students and alumni are too. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, Amherst alumni, students, faculty and staff submitted suggestions for the new Amherst College Mascot | Mascot Vote Explained | Amherst College Issue. Get ready to cheer for the Amherst College Mammoths. Amherst has become fascinated by all things Mammoth. CBS affiliate WSHM spoke to students over the few months who were upset about the mascot. Suggested Mascots - amherst.edu In February 2017, the Mascot Committee used input from 441 student and alumni delegates who rated the semifinalists according to the criteria and alumni feedbackto identify the top five mascot ideas. Amherst College decides to drop controversial Lord Jeff mascot Read our news stories about mammoth resurrections, mammoths in pop culture and more. Very compelling. Although I do have sone suggestions as to what the new mascot should be, as well as how that should be determined, I would, however, first like to focus on what I consider to be a more important issue steming from its association with Lord Jeffrey - and that is the apparent demise of, what was, in my day, our college song, "Lord Jeffery Amherst was a Soldier of the King." WebAmherst College Ditches Genocidal Racist Mascot For The Mammoths Buzzy Robinson 5 years ago Changing times means changing mascots. All rights reserved. Market data provided by Factset. Chan, however, said that his proposed contest will search for a mascot that is non-Jeff and non-moose.. Elon Musk devastates BBC accuser with an antidote i prescribed in my How to Spot Dishonest Arguments book. Just because of this accident of history, we dont have to stick with this. This is also good since our college is co-ed. (Heads up: the college has plans to install hamster wheel standing desks in all new dorm rooms. The colleges mascot debate entered a new phase last month when Adrian Chan 17 brought a petition to change the mascot to President Biddy Martin and senior Who hasnt? "I don't understand how somebody could identify with Lord Jeff, didn't do a lot of great things. Sometimes it is the mascot that spurs & embodies change. According to Sweeney, Lord Jeffery Amherst was already negatively inclined toward Native Americans, seeing them as less-than-valuable allies during the French and Indian War, and his attitude led to a decline in the alliance between his troops and the Native Americans. As this was Br is the German word for bear. He said that the mascot was still represented on some shorts that athletes wear, but that replacement lacrosse shorts would not have depictions of Lord Jeff. Nov. 17, 2015 Lord Jeff, Amherst Colleges unofficial mascot, tarnished by his dealings with Native Americans more than 200 years ago, has become the latest In an email to the signatories, Chan announced that a website onto which students can upload alternative mascot designs will be set up by the end of the semester, and suggested creating a schedule that would designate an official mascot by the end of the 2015-2016 academic year. In view of the fact that microscopic pathogens were not known until the late 1800s, how was he so prescient? Now, before we enter the spring of 2016 (my last semester here), the Lord Jeff still remains Amhersts mascot. 50 Years Ago Two new employees have joined the advertising and editorial departments of the Daily Hampshire Gazette. I think Amherst is already a place that lacks tradition and identity, and the traditions that remain here are dying out quickly. Amherst College Vote: Mascot Name Receives Its publicized now., A version of this article appears in print on, Amherst Mascot Gets Thumbs Down From Faculty, https://www.nytimes.com/2015/11/18/us/amherst-mascot-gets-thumbs-down-from-faculty.html. Timeline. / CBS/AP. Mascots and Diversity Amherst College changed their mascot from the Lord Jeffs (short for Lord Jeffrey Amherst) to the Mammoths. Amherst has become fascinated by all things Mammoth. UMass Minutemen football Web(the) purple and white ? A As Darps The Amherst Darps Great Gray Owl Ham, the Colleges Hamster mascot I like the old one and dont believe it should have been During World War II, The Amherst Student stopped publication, and its temporary replacement was a four-page paper called The Jeff, which was much shorter due to a paper shortage. Trustees Chairman Cullen Murphy said in a statement Tuesday that the mascot is "driving people apart because of what it symbolizes to many in our community." Mascot According to Michael Kelly, Head of Archives and Special Collections at Amherst College, after the French and Indian War, Amherst saw no more need for an alliance with the Native Americans because the French had been defeated. I don't, for example, rembember anyone ever showing up at Amherst football games in the garb of an English general. I say Amhersts on purpose. Campuses. It was Ephraim Williams who instigated the firing of Jonathan Edwards from his pulpit in Northampton and the exile to mission work with the Housatonic Indians of Stockbridge. What arguments have been made against keeping the Jeff? The board initially received hundreds of sometimes whimsical and silly suggestions. So far, this alumnus has seen no account of the grievances of students beyond the initial "demands" and stories of the Frost rumble, stories that were obsolete when published. Quotes displayed in real-time or delayed by at least 15 minutes. First published on January 26, 2016 / 2:53 PM. Amherst College has no established procedure of removing a mascot or instituting a new mascot. As an older (and therefore, some would say, wiser) alumnus (Class of '55), I am both respectiful of tradition, yet realize that the dogged maintnance of some traditions is not always the best course to take. Waxwing (Bombycilla sp) He's just frankly a bad person," said Okome. The Lord Jeff has often been portrayed on the colleges athletic flyers and bulletins for decades. This cessation of diplomatic bartering, along with the British army going back on its word to vacate its forts near the Great Lakes after the French were defeated, led to a new surge of Native American attacks against colonists on the Western frontier in 1763. There have been several student referenda to adopt new mascots, including the moose, but none have passed. The petition included signatures of 480 students, faculty and staff. In any event, given the recent, although unofficial, votes of the current student body, as well as the faculty, I would (as a former amateur bookie) predict that he's on the way out. Bull! Newer Post . In total, 9,295 people WebAmherst College Mascot Selection. Voting is open through March 31, 2017! On October 24, 2016, Amherst College launched a process to select an official mascot. I could easily see Amherst with a purple mammoth mascot.. Again, a plus. At the Association of Amherst Students senate meeting on Oct. 5 at which the AAS officially took a stance against the Lord Jeff, some senators expressed concerns that the current student body would fail to accurately represent the opinions of Amhersts alumni, many of whom have been vocal about their support for the Lord Jeff. mascot -- Amherst College trustees have voted to stop using Lord Jeff as the school's unofficial mascot because of its negative historical connotations. The song was included in the Glee Club program, and added to the Amherst College Songbook in 1906. The whole thing had been frivolously conceived and carelessly done, without any reference to historical justification or fact and even with Jefferys name mis-spelled, Hamilton wrote, in a letter from 1934 held in the Archives and Special Collections. In fall 2016, the wider College community contributed 2,045 mascot suggestions. I think youll be pleased to know that it was a unanimous vote against using the Lord Jeff, Ms. Epstein said, to raucous cheers and applause from students. Amherst College220 South Pleasant StreetAmherst, MA 01002, A students creative rendition of a mammoth A. Amherst Pride | Amherst College Mascot | Amherst College Amherst WebUMass began playing football on November 22, 1879, when the school was known as Massachusetts Agricultural College, and the team was known as the "Aggies." The only anagram. Apr 14, 2023, Amherst College changes name of mascot to an extinct herbivorepoetic, How to Spot Dishonest Arguments and keep your own thinking straight. Consider the Hamster: Amhersts New Mascot, President Creates Task Force for Diversity, Its Time to Stop Using Plastic Water Bottles, Womens Basketball Looks to Bounce Back from First Loss of the Season, Mens Hockey Splits Two Tough Games Against NESCAC Opponents, Photographer Steven Rosenfield Visits Amherst for Community Photo Project, Archivist Discovers Recording of MLK Speech, Womens Squash Competes Against Tough In-Conference Opponents, Reforming Amhersts Grading System to Encourage Student Growth. Who has taken a stance on the issue? It is now and will remain forever the scrambled mirroring of who we are and always will be. An outbreak that left as many as one hundred Native Americans dead in Ohio Country was reported in 1764. He declined the post of commander of British forces during the American Revolutionary War, though he played a part as an adviser and commander of forces in England. Many of these mascot controversies center around teams using caricatures or slurs that people perceive as ethnically stereotyping Native Americans. They are delightfully appropriate for competitive teams, noted one entry. -occasionally known to become drunk by eating fermented berries (uncertain if deliberately) Like amy other song, it's a poem set to music, and in the case of our college song, the music is much more important than each of the specific words of the poem. He fought the French in Europe during the Seven Years War in 1956 as a soldier, and again in North America during the French and Indian war from 1756 to 1763 as commander of 11,000 British soldiers. I had no problem, for example, with Amherst expanding its student body in the mid-seventies to include women students, or to do away with fraternities. As an author and blogger solely on the subject of college and pro team mascots and nicknames, I rarely see an article in a college newspaper that gets it as right as the 23 October story by Dan Ahn and Jingwen Zhang ("Explaining the Mascot Debate"). Archives of The Amherst Student dating at least as far back as 1931 include references to Amherst teams as the Jeffs. For the board of trustees has declared: Amherst College will always be the name of the school. Hence hamster will always be spot-on. A mammoth congratulations to the class of 2020! The Associated Press contributed to this report. -year-round distribution includes New England Well written, and also ridiculous, and also profound. AMHERST Current Amherst College students overwhelmingly support replacing Lord Jeff as the colleges unofficial mascot, according to poll results released Thursday by the Association of Amherst Students, the schools student government association. It has a dark history and I don't think that's representative of our school," she said. The Indian became their unofficial mascot in the 1920s, when it became ubiquitously used by local sportswriters. Typical Professor George. When did the Jeff become Amhersts mascot? In 1905, James Shelley Hamilton, a 1906 graduate and a member of Glee Club, wrote a song titled Lord Jeffery Amherst., Oh, Lord Jeffery Amherst was a soldier of the King, and he came from across the sea, read part of the lyrics. By. In late June, Amherst brought up the idea of introducing the deadly disease smallpox to Native Americans using blankets infected with the virus to Colonel Henry Bouquet. As part of our unprecedented virtual celebration for the class of 2020, our Mammoth processed across the main quad and received an Amherst College diploma. Don Faulstick, the athletic director at the college, also told about 150 students who were assembled in a hall on campus on Tuesday that, since September, the college athletic teams had begun removing the mascot from athletic gear. He once reportedly suggested deliberately infecting the local Indians with smallpox. Are the students, faculty, administrators, and alumni who voted for this change all herbivores? Is that a virtue? I agree with that decision because, as to this issue, I believe that making all of our students feel at home and fully accepted by the college substantially outweighs whatever tradition may be involved. The Amherst Student ArchiveAmherst College. What is the mascot for the University of Connecticut? Consider the Hamster: Amhersts New Mascot. This is good. The results were then ratified by three alumni Inspectors of Election, who also oversee the Alumni Trustee Election. Get ready to cheer for the Amherst College Mammoths. Cheers. Some hamsters are male and some are female. Those who have argued in favor of the Lord Jeff have said that the Lord Jeff is one of the colleges few historical traditions, and therefore serves too important a role in the community to be removed. Amherst College decides to drop controversial Lord Jeff mascot. And I would guess that a very large percentage of our current alumni would agree, although, admitedly, that percentage figure may have increased over time because a lot of those old guys are dead). Students here have been known to burn the midnight oil. Native American tribes near the Great Lakes continued to resist British rule, leading to Pontiacs Rebellion. Please enter valid email address to continue. There were student referenda to reinstate the Indian and select other mascots including the griffin, but from 1972 to 1981, Cardinal was the unofficial nickname of athletics at the university. There has been no evidence of the Lord Jeff being instated as Amherst Colleges official mascot. An herbivore is a vegetarian. The results were entertaining, to say the least! Rhymes with gangsta. But he has fallen out of favor with some students and faculty members for his role in giving smallpox-infected blankets to Native Americans. Amherst College is proud to announce today that the Mammoths are the first official mascot. AMHERST, Mass. The director of the Amherst College Press (Walter A. Dyer) offers "Sabrinas" as an Amherst nickname on par with Lord Jeffs in a standard reference on early twentieth century nicknames. Who better to announce such an event than our Mammoth sledding down Memorial Hill (and meeting a familiar foe)? Opinion polls about abstract policy questions are not reliable predictors of elections. Students graduate, school professors and presidents come and go. Olivia Pinney 17, an AAS senator and member of the Traditions Committee, said no team really liked the idea of being called Lady Jeffs. Today, though, the bone of contention lies in how to deal with a mascot tainted by a historical association with biological warfare and genocide. 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Around the time Amherst College began admitting women, discussion centered around what to call womens sports teams.