Month: December 2020

The Chronicle of Higher Education recently identified five schools that “you might not know are tied to slaveholders” (Rutgers, University of Cincinnati, Sweet Briar College, Furman, and George Mason).  

Against this background, it’s not surprising that investigators are beginning to shine a harsh light on unsavory associations of colleges and universities that extend far beyond slavery.  Here are three examples recently discovered by University Life:

Johansen-Poulsen Barber College  (Grygla, Minnesota) — Founded in 1824 by Norwegian immigrant Torvil “Wally” Johansen-Poulsen, this is the most prestigious barber college in northwestern Minnesota.  (The first Beatles haircut in the United States was given there in February 1963.) 

It now appears that Mr. Johansen-Poulsen was a cat hoarder, keeping up to 125 felines at a time in his small, one-bedroom home.  According to University of Minnesota cat genealogist Wendy Trilsk-Hammond, Johansen-Poulson named all of his cats “Vincent,” which generated a paralyzing level of confusion whenever he attempted to summon one of them.  The incidence of mental illness in the cats he owned was at least five times higher than the overall rate for domestic felines in Minnesota.  

Trustees are considering a number of new names for the College, with a decision expected by mid-2021.

The University of Arkansas — The Fayetteville school has removed a statue of country legend Johnny Cash from the entrance to its Razorback Horseshoe Pit on the south side of campus.  This action was prompted by a reconsideration of the line, “I shot a man in Reno just to watch him die,” from Cash’s 1968 hit song, Folsom Prison Blues.

“Let’s be clear,” explains Chancellor Joseph Steinmetz.  “In Arkansas we do NOT have a problem with people shooting people.  We do it all the time.  Hell, just last week I filled my 16-year-old nephew’s left buttock with buckshot when I caught him siphoning gas out of my SUV.  But you’ve got to have a good reason for shooting someone.  ‘To watch him die’ is not a good reason.  Not even close.”

University of Southern California — The Sonny and Cher Performing Arts Center will be stripped of the musical duo’s name in July 2021.  According to USC President Carol Folt, there is now a consensus among historians that Sonny and Cher were primarily responsible for the revival of public interest in bell-bottom pants throughout the 1970s.   

“To have USC associated with this unfathomable fashion atrocity is simply not acceptable,” says Folt.  “So many lives and reputations were ruined, not to mention the tragedy of New York City’s Sewer Rat Panic of 1975, when thousands of rabid rodents surreptitiously scurried up the breeze-inflated pant legs of vulnerable Central Park walkers to inflict fatal ankle and calf wounds.  We lost many of our best and brightest that summer.  The time for reckoning has come.”

Amen, Sister Folt.  Amen. 

 

Yes, the pandemic has wreaked havoc upon college athletics.  Indeed, The Chronicle of Higher Education recently noted that “even universities as rich as Stanford are dropping sports that don’t generate significant ticket sales or television revenue, thereby crushing the dreams of swimmers, fencers, and rowers.”

In this meanest of all seasons, who would have thought that the much maligned NCAA would come to the rescue of higher education?  Well, the organization took a major step in that direction on Monday, when it officially approved the hybrid sport of swencing, in which two low-revenue sports — swimming and fencing — are combined in a single competition.  

In swencing, pairs of swimmers face each other in adjacent lanes and race (using the sidestroke) while fencing.  According to NCAA Commissioner Mark Emmert, schools that replace swimming and fencing teams with a single swencing squad effectively cut their expenses by 50%.

To be sure, there are a few glitches that need to be overcome.  The major one, Emmert observes, is “blood in the water.  If the competitors are using sharply pointed épées, and one of those babies punctures a vein or artery, you’ve got a mess on your hands.  Of course, you could employ blunted épées, but our TV contract with Fox Sports stipulates that only stiletto-pointed épées are acceptable.  

“Naturally, that raises the question of the occasional fatality occurring during a match, which results in a body sinking to the bottom of the pool while competitors in other lanes continue to duel and race.  We’ve tried deploying strategically placed piranha to keep the bottom clean, but those feisty little predators can’t resist the churning legs of the survivors swimming at the surface.  That only compounds the blood-in-the-water problem.  In any event, we’re optimistic that this obstacle can be surmounted. 

“To be honest, the folks at Fox see the piranha as a ratings booster.  They claim that viewers will enjoy watching the competitors simultaneously battle their opponents and the piranha while attempting to win their races.”

University Life reporters attended a swencing exhibition featuring UCLA and the University of Florida on Monday, and dammit, Fox may have a point.  Piranha-enhanced swencing ROCKS!

 

 

 

True Fact:  The American Historical Association has joined a lawsuit against the Trump administration, claiming that the White House is failing to comply with the Presidential Records Act and is denying historians access to “records documenting a critical part of our nation’s history.”

However, not every scholar is on board with the lawsuit.  A splinter group, the Positive Past Coalition (PPC), has filed an amicus curiae brief in the case, arguing that all records documenting the Trump administration’s actions should be destroyed.  Here’s an excerpt from the PPC’s brief:

“Our society would best be served if all reminders of the uncapped, chunk-filled septic tank known as the Trump administration were expunged.  The stench inside the Beltway since 2017 has been overpowering, devastating both flora and fauna, and no beneficial purpose is accomplished by having a clown car filled with academics diving into this muck in the name of discovering ‘the facts’.

“Let’s be honest.  Does it really matter if one determines that a particular pile of steaming poop in the meadow was deposited by a horse, a cow, or the President’s Chief of Staff?  It’s ALL poop.

“Nothing good comes from dredging up, and rubbing one’s nose in, a sordid past.  Think of how much better off everyone would be if we could simply forget that slavery existed in the United States.  Recalling that noxious chapter in our history only puts people in a bad mood, and — more importantly — makes white folks uncomfortable whenever they just want to relax on their couch on a Friday night and watch Gone with the Wind on Turner Classic Movies without feeling guilty.  Is that too much to ask?

“The historian’s responsibility is NOT to remind people of their unpleasant encounters with food poisoning, but to help them recall the flavor of all those delicious burgers and curly fries they consumed as they strolled down life’s boardwalk.  C’mon, professors, let’s do our job!”

Would someone please pass the ketchup?