{"id":22,"date":"2023-06-08T03:59:57","date_gmt":"2023-06-08T03:59:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/hctac\/?p=22"},"modified":"2023-06-08T04:08:46","modified_gmt":"2023-06-08T04:08:46","slug":"oregon-agricultural-college-dress-traditions","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/hctac\/2023\/06\/08\/oregon-agricultural-college-dress-traditions\/","title":{"rendered":"Oregon State University Dress Traditions"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

By Jennifer Mower<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

These caps were recently donated to the HCTAC by the Nichols family, whose relative, Benjamin Nichols was a freshman at Oregon Agricultural College in 1917. He earned a degree in Mechanical Engineering in 1919 and went on to earn a Master\u2019s of Science degree in 1932. Between 1934 and 1953 he worked as faculty in the Electrical Engineering program at Oregon State College.

The orange felt Oregon Agriculture College cap is similar to a hat in the Benton County Historical Society and Museum collection<\/a>. The tasseled cap has a Meier & Frank department store label. The green felt rook cap was required daily attire for freshman males, women wore hair ribbons, in the early 1900s when the tradition began and lasted until 1960s, when it was required only on Wednesdays (\u201cSchool Traditions at OSU #3, 2012). See Figure 1 for a picture of one OSU freshman wearing a rook lid in 1969. These green caps or \u201clids\u201d as they were called, were useful in identifying freshmen to upperclassmen.

In addition to conspicuous head wear, freshman were required to \u201ccarry at all times the \u2018Rook bible,\u2019 a small book giving information of interest and value to the newcomer at the college,\u201d including information about school traditions, names of deans and Associated Student officers, organizations, publications, school songs, and so forth (The Beaver 1926-27, 44). \u201cRooks had several rules which, when violated, earned discipline carried out by the sophomore class\u201d (\u201cSchool Traditions at OSU #3, 2012). At the University of Georgia in Athens, punishments for not wearing freshman caps included cleaning toilets, being paddled, or other forms of condoned hazing (Hunt-Hurst and Blanco 2013, 3).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Back in Corvallis, freshman would \u201cburn their green [caps] . . . at the annual Junior Weekend held at the end of May, signifying their advancement into the sophomore class. In 1961, OSC had become Oregon State University, and \u201cthe Burning of the Green had moved to Homecoming in the fall\u201d (\u201cSchool Traditions at OSU #3, 2012). Freshman caps are a form of symbolic communication, expressing group \u201cmembership in the larger university community, and marking the student as a new\u2014and therefore less meritorious\u2014member of that community\u201d (Hurst and Blanco, 2013, 2). Rook \u201clids\u201d appear to have fallen out of use by the OSU student body in the late 20th century.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Figure 1. Historical Images of Oregon State University, Oregon State University, 1969. A student wears his “rook lid” while walking on campus Retrieved from https:\/\/oregondigital.org\/concern\/images\/df71d721f<\/a>

<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Works Cited:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Hunt-Hurst, Patricia and Jose Blanco, 2013. \u201cGeorgia History in Pictures,\u201d Georgia Historical Quarterly 97, 4: 447-475.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Oregon State College felt cap, 1923. Benton County Historical Society and Museum Pinterest<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe Rook Green,\u201d (2012). School Traditions at OSU #3, Retrieved from https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/scarc\/2012\/03\/<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Jennifer Mower These caps were recently donated to the HCTAC by the Nichols family, whose relative, Benjamin Nichols was a freshman at Oregon Agricultural College in 1917. He earned a degree in Mechanical Engineering in 1919 and went on to earn a Master\u2019s of Science degree in 1932. Between 1934 and 1953 he worked […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":13321,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-22","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/hctac\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/hctac\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/hctac\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/hctac\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/13321"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/hctac\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=22"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/hctac\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":27,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/hctac\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22\/revisions\/27"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/hctac\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/hctac\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=22"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/hctac\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=22"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}