ADVERTISEMENT

I ask this every year. The 1961 Sigma nu prank

I knew the guy who played "the Coach", he died about 15 years ago, or so.

Edit: The link above references a different person as Coach Howard, than the person I knew. I will have to get some clarification.
 
Last edited:
  • Like
Reactions: jeff2001
thats hilarious. If you dont have it, yall need to get the book by Travis Haney and Larry Williams about the rivalry. Its a good read. Would like a newer one to cover the last few years but still an awesome read
 
jimnasium said:
I wonder what the deal was with the fat guy waving the hat was, is he supposed to be coach Howard ?
Click to expand...
Had to be. I attended a couple of games - one vs. Bama in '67 and another vs. us in '68 - where he was their coach. His belly was huge. If this guy had really wanted to play the part to the max, he would have shaved the top of his head, as Howard was bald.
 
My professor was one of the Sigma Nu's at the time and he described what they did... I just can't remember his name, it been since 1981 since I had his class...
 
Florida copied the spoof against the Gamecocks five years later in 1966 ... but the original could never be matched. In 1961 the Sigma Nus of USC pulled a prank on Clemson that made the news as far away as California and New York. This is a first hand, behind the scenes, account of how it all went down ...

Yep, I was a member of the Sigma Nus. It was Nov 11, 1961. Big day against ClemSin. We had started the year 1-5, and so another losing season was upon us. But what the hell? We partied with the best of them! Question was, how could we save the season?

College Pranks were legendary back then. A couple of years before, ClemSin students had vandalized statues of respected Carolina Alumni on Sumter Street before the Big Thursday game! That had gotten a lot of state attention. So Carroll Gray, believe it or not, now the Pres. of the Charlotte Chamber of Commerce, came up, along with Doc Howard of Gray Court, SC (Doc later was instrumental with Ed Robinson in creating the Cockabooses), with the Prank of all Pranks: Our frat would dress up as the ClemSin Tigers and appear on the field of Carolina Stadium pregame, and spoof the ClemSin faithful! (in 1961, Carolina Stadium held about 47,000. Same location, and was the predecessor to W-B).

At any rate, the fraternity had 3 weeks to prepare for the big event. Bo Mullis, my college roommate who was later to become the President of the South Carolina Trial Lawyers Association, and I, were USC cheerleaders, and therefore were not part of the Clemson pre-game team as we had to go on as usual as cheerleaders egging on the crowd with our hottie partners! (Mine was Anna Louise Long, Bo's was Carole Jones, whom he later married). But we were privy as to what was going to happen, and had participated in the three week practice.

No kidding. The fraternity practiced looking like a football team for three weeks in secret, running onto the field, doing drills, synchronized push-ups, stretches, and so forth.

The secrecy was made as a collective blood oath: It was great! like being in the CIA! Unbelievable, but more than 50 kids all kept it to ourselves, a remarkable task. The more I reflect upon it as the years passed, the more I realize what a monumental secret we all kept, because when it happened, it was shocking to 47,000 people, and ultimately to all of college football!

Anyway, we had an inside track to Orangeburg High School through one of our members. Their colors were Clemson colors, Orange and Purple, and we were able to appropriate Orangeburg's uniforms for the weekend.

In years past, the Carolina-Clemson game had been played on Thursdays, and as most of you know, it was the only game in the US played on Thursday. In the State of South Carolina it was known as Big Thursday. But Frank Howard and the Clemsin folk, didn't like playing the big game in Columbia every year during state fair week, so on Nov 11, 1961, it was the first Big Saturday in Columbia.

Meanwhile, as the Big Saturday approached, the Sigma Nus practiced and practiced doing the Clemsin warmups.

We had found an old milk cow and Ed Hancock was in charge of trucking it to the stadium. The cow was going to have a sheet tied on it declaring her the Clemson Homecoming Queen. Ed and a few others loaded Bessie onto the back of a pickup truck and headed to Columbia from Lexington County.

Meanwhile, inside the stadium, the pregame crowd was loud, and the Clemson band was playing Hold that Tiger, and the Carolina Band was playing our Old Fight Song. (Which is great and should be brought back!) They were like dueling bands! We were cheering Culture vs Agri-Culture! and Beat the Damn Farrrrmers! and the Clemsin rats (frosh) were in unison standing and giving Carolina hell.

Then it happened. The Sigma Nus came streaming out of the Southeast corner of the endzone, and Clemson fans could be heard yelling Here Come The Tigers!!, and the ClsmSin cannon went off! And their band broke into Hold that Tiger!

And the Sigma Nus lined up and started doing precision drills, doing synchronized pushups and exercises, and then Ronald Leitch comes strolling out on the field with a pillow stuffed under his all black outfit, posing as Coach Frank Howard (of Howard's Rock fame), and the Clemsin crowd goes nuts! And then Ronald starts spitting black stuff from his mouth like tobacco juice from an oil well, and the Sigma Nus degenerate from precision drills to spastic displays of ineptitude. The punter starts practicing punts which go over his head. The erratic qb starts fumbling, the running back starts doing somersaults at the line of scrimmage, the football starts slipping out of the hand of whoever has it, and suddenly, the Clemsin fans know they've been had! First the rats come pouring onto the field, then the rest of the Tigger faithful, and there's an old fashioned rip roaring riot on your hands, right there on the middle of the field, with the entire Carolina faithful laughing their collective asses off as they realize what's happened! The poor Clemsin students lose the fight as they are cracking knuckles upside the heads of Sigma Nus protected by helmets, shoulder pads and other articles of exoskeleton attire. Young turks such as Guy Meares, Alden Sweatman, Jerry Ballentine get in serious punches to unnamed Clemsin rats! Not to mention future Lt. Governor of SC, Mike Daniel from Gaffney who cracked a couple of skulls, or Chuck Simons from Aiken, a future SC Supreme Court Judge, or scrappy future attorney from Gastonia, Ben Morrow, who gave a lick or two, or Guy Meares, and Alden Sweatman from Columbia, Bennie Pendarvis from Barnwell, and Jeffrey Brooker from Denmark, all future medical docs of note who were two fisted that day, and held their own! It was one heck of a fraternity, and one heck of a prank!

We won the game by the way 21-14!

And the riot was reported in papers as far away as the Los Angeles Times and the Detroit Free Press.

By the way, Sigma Nus who were on the team and could not participate in the big prank, were John Caskey, who later was an All-ACC end, and Johnny Jones, and Richard Lomas. Later, Dan Reeves pledged Sigma Nu, largely because of them.

And finally, the old cow, Bessie, the Clemsin Homecoming Queen never made it to the field. She actually died enroute to the stadium on the back of the truck. If you don't believe me, ask Ed Hancock!

https://247sports.com/college/south...d-Account-Of-The-1961-Sigma-Nu-Pra-104268569/
 
sigmanu.0.0.jpg


https://www.footballstudyhall.com/2013/2/24/4016996/clemson-south-carolina-sigma-nu-1961

The Historical: South Carolina's Great Sigma Nu Caper of 1961
3
The 1961 Clemson vs. South Carolina was expected to be a humdrum affair between two mediocre squads winding down bowl-less seasons. But the brothers of South Carolina's Sigma Nu fraternity had a different idea.

The Clemson vs. South Carolina series is often overshadowed by other great intra-state rivalries in college football. Yet few can boast as chaotic a contest as the 1961 meeting between the Gamecocks and the Tigers. It began with one of the most epic on-field pranks in the history of the sport and ended with fans fighting each other on the field.

Before it was all over, tobacco juice flew through the air, pants were dropped to the ankles and one man had died in the stands. And a pretty exciting football game took place as well.

But let's start from the beginning.

Under head coach Frank Howard, Clemson College had become a power in the 40s and 50s. Between 1956 and 1959 his Tigers had claimed three Atlantic Coast Conference championships but fell to fourth in the conference in 1960 with a 6-4 record. South Carolina was led by first-year coach Marvin Bass. The Gamecocks had seen success under previous coach Warren Giese but his unsatisfying 3-6-1 record in 1960 resulted in his departure.

Neither team had seen any type of resurgence as the 59th edition of the rivalry game approached. After almost two months of football South Carolina had earned an uninspiring 2-5 record and Clemson's was scarcely better at 3-4. The hot debate leading up to the rivalry contest was the decision to move it from Thursday, when it had traditionally occurred, to Saturday.

More than 50 members of the South Carolina's Sigma Nu fraternity decided that even victory was not enough.

"Another losing season was upon us, so what the hell?" recalled prankster Theodore Kohn. "The question was, how could we save the season?"

The answer was an elaborate pre-game caper to lampoon their in-state foes -- a scheme that became possible when South Carolina coach Marvin Bass gave his approval after fraternity members sold it to him as "good, clean fun." The Gamecocks coach not only agreed to allow the group to access the field before the game, he allowed them to use the team's practice field to prepare for the stunt.

Prepare they did. For three weeks leading up to the game the Sigma Nus began regular practices doing drills - running onto the field, synchronized push-ups and stretches - almost like they were preparing to play the rivalry contest themselves.The clincher for the gag was a connection with nearby Orangeburg High School's football team. The prep squad's uniforms were Clemson's orange and purple and the pranksters were able to appropriate them for their ruse.

The group had even appropriated a cow and prepared a banner to adorn the animal declaring it the Clemson homecoming queen. (The bovine never made it to the field, reportedly dying on the way to the stadium.)

On Nov. 11, 1961, with more than 47,000 spectators on hand in Colombia's Carolina Stadium the group put their plan into action. As the bands warmed up for the game the Sigma Nus suddenly came streaming out the Southeast corner of the end zone as if they were the Clemson squad.

They were accompanied by one prankster dressed as the Clemson's folksy coach complete with a pillow under his shirt to approximate Howard's girth.

"The outfit cost me $10.97 at Goodwill," confessed Sigma Nu member Ron Leitch years later.

The Clemson band started playing the school's fight song the team's fans began cheering for the group on the field they believed were their players. Everything seemed normal as the bogus Clemson squad assembled as if to do their warm ups. But after a few minutes, the group began to display some... problems.

The punter began kicking the ball behind him, running backs were doing somersaults at the line of scrimmage and everyone wearing orange seems incapable of holding onto the ball. The faux Frank Howard began spitting massive spurts of tobacco juice just about everywhere.

Finally the whole group gathered in the end zone to perform "the most prissified dance you've ever seen" according the participant's accounts.

Clemson fans realized the ruse and were not particularly happy about it. A group of Tiger fans clambered onto the field to confront the pranksters and then South Carolina fans descended to confront them. The result was a melee that took officials half hour to calm. The faux Clemson team and their "coach" were able to escape to an equipment closet under the stadium relatively unscathed.

Clemson wouldn't find revenge on the gridiron. The Tigers fell to the Gamecocks 21-14 when South Carolina's Jim Costen scooped up a teammate's fumble and dashed 28-yards for the winning touchdown. Clemson took the ball 74 yards in the final two minutes of the game but a Gamecock goal line stand as clock ran out preserved the South Carolina victory.

The roller-coaster conclusion to the contest proved too much for one South Carolina fan who died of heart attack in the stands as time expired.

The final whistle didn't bring the drama of the day to a close. The pre-game brawl was matched by another after the final whistle with fans fighting on the field for more than half an hour after the game had ended. At one point, one unfortunate combatant lost his pants and was then drug along the ground with them wrapped about his ankles.

The day after the game, a police officer appeared at the Sigma Nu fraternity house summoning Gray for a meeting with William Patterson, the school's chief administrative officer. The fraternity member "spilled his guts" and awaited the pronouncement of punishment.

"Dr. Patterson listened, then sat there and looked at me for what seemed like 10 minutes," Gray recalled to The State newspaper years later. "Then he said, ‘That was pretty funny, but don't do it again. Now, get out of here.'"

Sources:
Foster, Jim. "Battling USC Tops Clemson 21-14; Thriller Ends with Tigers Driving." The Herald [Spartanburg, SC] 12 Nov. 1961, Final ed., Sports sec.:pp 1+. Print.

Haney, Travis, and Larry Williams. Classic Clashes of the Carolina-Clemson Football Rivalry: A State of Disunion. Charleston, SC: History, 2011. pp 95-99. Print.

Hendrix, Hubert. "Macabre Drama Hardly Noticed As Carolina Side Roars Victory." The Herald [Spartanburg, SC] 12 Nov. 1961, Final ed., A sec.:pp 1+. Print.

Hook, Julia. "Pranksters Rehash the Great Clemson Caper of 1961." The Colombia Star. 23 Sept. 2011: pp. A1. Online. Accessed. 23 Feb. 2013.

Kohn, Theodore. "A First Hand Account Of The 1961 Sigma Nu Prank." GamecockAnthem.com. Scout.com, 18 Nov. 2005. Accessed. 23 Feb. 2013.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Similar threads

L

2025 Blythewood DT Sterling Sanders drawing interest talks Gamecocks

Replies
0
Views
334
The Insiders Forum
Lee Wardlaw
L
D

Tommy Moody passes

Replies
0
Views
634
Gamecocks Forum
DeeDave
D
Alan Cole

South Carolina Men's Basketball Open Locker Room Report (Post-Auburn)

Replies
0
Views
518
The Insiders Forum
Alan Cole
Alan Cole
Caleb Alexander

Tyler vs. Dabo from TigerIllustrated.com

Replies
0
Views
743
The Insiders Forum
Caleb Alexander
Caleb Alexander
Caleb Alexander

My Interview With UGASports.com

Replies
0
Views
555
The Insiders Forum
Caleb Alexander
Caleb Alexander
ADVERTISEMENT

Latest posts

ADVERTISEMENT
Top Bottom
Back