It’s springtime, when Old Gold’s thoughts turn to…the archives? After a long cold winter, Old Gold is as ready as anyone for baseball, bicycling, and croquet. His quest to track down University history doesn’t stop at faculty committee minutes and back issues of course catalogs, either. No, Old Gold wants to know how people had fun back in the day, too.

Ergo, spring. Perhaps no season elicits more mirth and mayhem among students than the time of rebirth and awakening. Old Gold, who graduated from high school in 1974, remembers the campus streaking craze of those early months. Unfortunately for Old Gold, the nearest campus was 30 miles away, and his timing wasn’t fortuitous: by the following spring, when he was a college freshman, the fad had faded. And so it’s gone for countless other Iowa campus rituals as well, before and since.

Old Gold looked through the archives’ Traditions vertical file and found evidence of some early–20th century gems. Granted, the First Annual Frolic Day on June 15, 1909, for example, was close to summer, but it was technically a spring event nonetheless. Activities included a tub race, a greased-pole climb, a pillow match, and a three-legged race. A base ball game (it was spelled with two words at the time) pitted the experienced and savvy law class of ’04 against the youthful, enthusiastic medics class of ’09.

For the more cerebral, the 1914 Frolic featured a human chess game on the old Iowa Field (see photo). Don’t tire, pawns, from standing completely motionless while strategists take their time to make the next move. Fight fiercely, Hawkeyes! Checkmate!

The Frolic faded, but Senior Day took its place in 1922. Not everyone thought highly of such organized mischief, though. Prior to the third annual event, William G. Raymond, dean of the College of Applied Science (now the College of Engineering), complained in a letter to President Walter Jessup that shutting down the University for one day was wasteful: “I am sure that the exercises thus far, with one or two notable exceptions, have been wholly unworthy of an institution of this character.” Students rebelled the following week by costume dancing with a maypole on the Pentacrest lawn (see photo).

Here’s to spring, Hawkeyes. And checkmate.

—David McCartney, University Archivist

Human chess game for Senior Frolic, The University of Iowa, 1914 [F.W. Kent Collection (RG 30.01.01), Events and Activities Series, Senior Frolic folder, University of Iowa Archives, Department of Special Collections, UI Libraries].

Women in costume dancing with a maypole on the Pentacrest lawn, The University of Iowa, June 1924 [F.W. Kent Collection (RG 30.01.01), Events and Activities Series, Fetes folder, University Archives, Department of Special Collections, UI Libraries].

Women dancing on Iowa Field during the Mayday Fete, The University of Iowa, 1920s [F.W. Kent Collection (RG 30.01.01), Events and Activities Series, Fetes folder, University Archives, Department of Special Collections, UI Libraries].