Football and the Fight Song

Today I enjoyed the privilege of exploring the Floyd J. "Peck" Huntley Collection. Peck was a player at Oregon Agricultural College (I believe that is the third official name of OSU) in 1909, 1910, and 1914. Included in his collection where two specific items I practically drooled over.

The first was a 1914 copy of Harold A. Wilkins' "Hail to Old O.A.C.: A Rooter's Song," the precursor to today's modern OSU Fight Song. What made me very excited was the existence of a second verse of which I had no prior knowledge. Here are the lyrics:

Here we come with a toast and song for the college up on the hill,
We love its shady slopes and trees, Its mem’ries cheer and thrill;
But fondest thoughts when the years have run, Will be of teams and vict’ries won, Each man a loyal son, Hail to old O.A.C.

Chorus:
O.A.C., our hats are off to you, Beavers, Beavers, fighters thru and thru,
We’ll cheer for ev’ry man, We’ll root for ev’ry stand, that’s made for old O.A.C.
Watch our team go tearing down the field, Men of iron, their strength will never yield.
Hail! Hail! Hail! Hail! Hail to old O.A.C. 

We’ll rout hard for the baseball star who can knock out a long home run,
And cheer the man who kicks the goal, That means the game is won;
But mem’ries best in our Hall of Fame, Are for the man who’s always game, Win, lose, fights just the same, All for old O.A.C. 

Repeat Chorus

The modern Fight Song only uses the Chorus with a drum and chant interlude, and the modern "Hail to OSU" includes the interlude and omits the second verse. One thing I thought especially interesting is that the modern lyrics of "O.S.U. our hats are off to you" flows much better than O.A.C.-- it is refreshing to see a name-change actually improve the song.


The other thing I saw in the collection is probably much more interesting to almost everyone besides me: a ball used in the 1914 contest between O.A.C. and Idaho, played in Portland, OR.

Compare those laces to these!

Pretty cool, huh?