Students from Sam Houston State University have written a book about high school mascots here in Texas. You know, some of them are quite unusual, with great stories behind them.

It's the single-name schools that attract the attention.

Like the Hutto Hippos, a name that goes back to 1915 when a hippo escaped from a circus train in Austin and finally was found in a creek near Hutto, about 25 miles to the northeast.

In the 1924 yearbook at Mason High School, the football team was called the cowpunchers, another term for cowboy.

As the years went by, the name got shortened to the Punchers, and it survives. The school plays in the Puncher Dome.

Local economies factor into many of the names. In the 1940s, the Rockcrushers of Knippa got their name when a rock-crushing plant moved there, and Rocksprings adopted the name the Angoras when it became "The Angora Goat Capital of the World."

Brazosport High School, along the Gulf Coast, has the Exporters. Robstown has its Cottonpickers, and Port Isabel, at the southern tip of the state on the Gulf of Mexico, has the Fighting Tarpons.

Some were obvious. In Hamlin? The Pied Pipers. Muleshoe? The Mules. And in Winters? The Blizzards.

Other one-of-a-kinds include the Porcupines of Springtown, who trace their mascot to a 1920s basketball player who suggested the name because people feared the animal's sharp quills. Local folks quoted in the book are more inclined to remember the awful smell of a real porcupine adopted by students in the 1960s.

Itasca's Wampus Cats owe their birth to a 1921 school pep rally where the term apparently was yelled out by a cheerleader. According to the book, it's either a Cherokee evil spirit, a legendary ferocious half-man, half-wildcat wandering Georgia or a striped cat from Tennessee.

The Mighty Red Ants of Progreso are named not for the pesky insect but for the nickname a beloved teacher called her students when the district had only one elementary school. When the high school was built, it was filled with her "little red ants."

In the book, football coach Elvis Hernandez is quoted as saying the school name prompts fans from opposing schools to greet his teams with signs of: "Got Raid?"

You have to remember -- historically, the local high school team was the focus of life in a community.

In some places, it still is.

During the Hurricane Rita evacuation, my wife and I stopped in Gainseville, Texas to fill her prescriptions. The hot topic of conversation between the pharmacy staff and the locals who were waiting to get their medication? That evening's homecoming game.

Posted by: Greg at 08:30 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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