It always amuses me how irritatingly dull school mascots often are. How many schools have the cougars, knights, bears, or some other cliched mascot? (A notable exception is the University of California Santa Cruz, home of the fighting Banana Slugs.) Given that, I was certainly glad to hear that paleontologist Jerry Harris is pushing to have his institution, Dixie State College, accept a dinosaur as the new school mascot.
Jerry needs your help, though. The college is accepting nominations for mascot suggestions and if you want to see the "Dixie Dinosaurs" come out on top go to the voting page and enter "Dixie Dinosaurs" into the "Nickname" field. You even get a crack at winning $100, so it's worth the 20 seconds of your time. Head on over and vote!
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As far as I can tell, the great majority of high-school sports team mascots are either large cats or stinging insects...
I think I may have a dubious distinction in terms of school mascots. My high school mascot (the hillcat) doesn't actually exist--it was chosen because it's alliterative with my town's name.
My undergrad mascot was the fighting blue hen (I went to the University of Delaware), which is weird enough. Except that the fighting blue hen (the one displayed on UD gear, the actual animal on which it is based, and the mascot costume) is actually a boy chicken--comb and all--not a hen. (I suppose "fighting blue cock" was just a bit too risque for the Delawareans.)
My grad school mascot, though, takes the cake. I went to Cornell for grad school. Cornell's mascot is...wait for it...THE COLOR RED. Seriously. Cornell is The Big Red. (It's often portrayed as a big red BEAR, but it is actually really just the color red.)
How's that for a doozy of a trilogy of mascots?
There are some interesting high school mascots listed at this website:
http://www.tekonsha.k12.mi.us/scaa/teamnames.htm
UC Irvine has the Anteaters, U South Carolina at Beaufort has the Sand Sharks, and Texas A&M Kingsville has the Javelinas.
Thought you might appreciate this: Prior to 1900, one of the several nicknames for the University of Nebraska-Lincoln athletic teams was (and I'm not making this up!) the 'Mankilling Mastodons'! Totally awesome!!!
As for wierd names, how 'bout this: My mon's high school team name was (again, I'm not making this up) the 'fighting canaries'!
Just wondering where Dr. Kate went to High School. Rogers State University, located in Claremore in northeastern Oklahoma, chose the Hillcat as their new sports mascot and is now in the process of naming him.