Was the team ever called the Cardinals? - Printable Version
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Was the team ever called the Cardinals? - TreeFitty - 12-06-2011
I came across the wiki page for the 1977 team and its listed as "cardinals" and in the history of edits it says "Stanford's fight name was "Cardinals" (plural) from 1972 to 1981" but with no citation.
Is this right?
Re: Was the team ever called the Cardinals? - TreeFitty - 12-06-2011
Hmm, guess so.
http://www.gostanford.com/school-bio/stan-nickname-mascot.html
Re: Was the team ever called the Cardinals? - Leftcoast - 12-06-2011
Wait a minute - I was a frosh in '81-'82 and we were told that the team was NEVER, EVER the Cardinals. I'm not buying this.
Re: Was the team ever called the Cardinals? - terry - 12-06-2011
In the mid to late 1970s, Stanford teams were called the Cardinals (plural). My recollection is that Cardinals wasn't viewed as a permanent name, but the teams had to be called something until there was a final resolution of the issue, so Cardinals was used.
Re: Was the team ever called the Cardinals? - Kathy - 12-06-2011
That period includes my time on campus, too (Class of '76), and I don't recall being called the Cardinals. So I checked my copies of The Quad and lo and behold, the sports write-ups refer to the Card, Cards, Cardinal and an occasional Cardinals. But ... I never really considered yearbook staff to be true journalists, so I checked my copy of One Hundred Years Of Headlines, a sort of Best of The Daily published in The Daily's centennial year. Anyway, there it was, at the top of the front page on Dec. 5, 1975:
Voters axe Indian mascot;
Robber Barons selected
Mark Simonian (who was editor then, I think) wrote that the present symbol, Cardinals, came in fourth in the voting.
(I still have a Robber Barons T-shirt somewhere from the Great Mascot Campaign. Personal favorite was the Sequoias.)
I guess I always associated the plural Cardinals with the bird and the singular term with the color, and since we weren't birds ...
Re: Was the team ever called the Cardinals? - Leftcoast - 12-06-2011
Quote:There is, in fact, a story about a Daily headline using the word "Cards" that contained the most egregious -- if entirely unintentional -- double entendre in the history of written language. Fortunately, it was caught as the pages were being composed in the ASSU Typesetting Shop, thus saving the career of a now-notable journalist (not me, wise guys) and possibly the existence of the Daily as a college newspaper. Alas, it cannot be told even now.
Aw ..... after that build-up you've just GOT to dish. We'll promise to keep it a closely held secret - Just between you, me and a couple 100 of our closest friends on the internet.  And maybe some friends who use Google.Â
Re: Was the team ever called the Cardinals? - Griffins78 - 12-06-2011
Whatever it takes!
Re: Was the team ever called the Cardinals? - terry - 12-06-2011
(12-06-2011, 05:28 PM)Kathy link Wrote:I checked my copy of One Hundred Years Of Headlines, a sort of Best of The Daily published in The Daily's centennial year. Anyway, there it was, at the top of the front page on Dec. 5, 1975:
Voters axe Indian mascot;
Robber Barons selected
Mark Simonian (who was editor then, I think) wrote that the present symbol, Cardinals, came in fourth in the voting.
(I still have a Robber Barons T-shirt somewhere from the Great Mascot Campaign. Personal favorite was the Sequoias.)
I remember that December 1975 vote. It's true that Robber Barons won and that Cardinals finished 4th. I believe the 2nd and 3rd spots were held by Sequoias and Trees, and that the 5th place finisher was Space Cowboys, though I'm not certain. But that was not a binding vote. The administration rejected it, and Stanford's teams continued to be called Cardinals until Don Kennedy decided that the nickname would be Cardinal.
Re: Was the team ever called the Cardinals? - Spiny_Norman - 12-06-2011
Don Kennedy made that declaration after the vote in 1980 (or 1981?) where the only choices were Gryphons (for the statues that were then in front of Encina), Sequoias and Cardinals. There were strong write in campaigns for Robber Barons, Thunder Chickens and Steaming Manhole Covers.
President Kennedy said that we would follow in the tradition of the Cornell Big Red, the Harvard Crimson, the Dartmouth Big Green. We thought it was bad form to let the students vote and then ignore their view entirely. But acceptance has come with 30 years of familiarity. I certainly did not want to read headlines about what the Huskies did to the Sequoias in the game on Saturday.
The Band did a show the following season in which it tried to ascertain what kind of Cardinal was represented by the nickname. Cardinal numbers? Cardinal sins? Cardinal the religious figure? The show was not in the class of "tribute to Joe Francis" but it was pretty good.
Re: Was the team ever called the Cardinals? - Nan3cy - 12-07-2011
Another good one from the band -- "not the bird, the color. Like the Red of Cornell, the Crimson of Harvard, the Green of Dartmouth, the yellow of journalism..."
:)