Archives Exhibit

Freshie Parade, 1913

Blindfolded freshmen running race in quad, 1920

Freshie costume, 1913

Punishment for freshmen crimes: students kneeling in quad, 1920

In 1922 a change in rules by the Student Union forbade initiation activities to take place off-campus. [2] This forced the Freshie parade to stay on university grounds instead of taking the historical route down Jasper Avenue.

Freshies participated in sporting events, like “pushball” and “chariot races” where two students would carry a third across a room by the arms and legs.

Freshies also frequently had their arms and sometimes their legs bound together while they were in various stages of dress. Pajamas and underwear on top of their clothing were perennial favourites. Freshies were customarily blindfolded and led around by sophs as punishment.

In a 1921 initiation account, freshie Parry Green wrote in a Letter to the Editor of the Gateway that he had been forced to crawl on hands and knees between lines of sophs who played “Ain’t We got Fun” [3] on his bum with two-by-fours. [4]

In response to Parry Green’s Gateway letter about his initiation experience, a letter signed I.M. Young was also published by the Gateway detailing initiation rituals for women. She complained that the private nature of the activities meant fewer people witnessed the events. Freshettes were, like freshies, required to dress in particular ways: wearing hair in a ponytail and a green ribbon on their ankle to mark themselves. They were forced to push peanuts across a floor using only their noses. They were given “medicine” and had their hair covered in vaseline before pledging allegiance to the Wauneitas. [5]

In the early 1920s, a Freshmen Committee was formed to look into student apathy and malaise after the Great War. They determined it was the shift to university life that was the problem. Despite this, further pushback was felt in the 1920s when students who refused to participate in initiation were singled out.