Contrary to popular belief, the choral scene on campus didn't always consist of our 30 some−odd a cappella groups. Even though we did have an active Glee Club in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, the records seem to indicate that most Jumbos in the early 1900s were simply crazy about singing, regardless of Glee Club membership.
This apparent singing craze resulted in large part from the efforts of the Ivy Society, a now−defunct organization created to promote school spirit in the junior class. The society was also well−known for its periodic publication of the Ivy Book, a thorough collection of Tufts−themed songs. The only reason I believe this document to be proof of a campus−wide singing craze is because the Ivy Book was not simply a thin pamphlet handed out at football games, but a 350−page volume that contained all the Tufts fight songs and class cheers, as well as about 20 variations on our alma mater.
Though I unfortunately did not have time to memorize every ditty about Charlie Tufts and the "dear old Brown and Blue," I certainly did notice a pattern to our choral history. Therefore, I think it would be appropriate to propose a new organizational system for the songs one can find in the Ivy Book:
1. Fight songs are probably the most common of the bunch. While most tend to be rather repetitive (I counted at least nine references to "the light on the Hill"), nothing matches the originality of "Tuftonia's Day" (1912). One can imagine Jumbos of yesteryear belting these lyrics at football games or even walking across campus and breaking into spontaneous, "High−School−Musical"−esque rounds of "Steady and true, rush along Brown and Blue, / Raise a mighty score today. / Fearless tear down the field and never yield! / Brown and Blue, Brown and Blue for aye!"
Not only does this tune allow for a nice display of Tufts pride, but the next verse of "T−U−F−T−S, T−U−F−T−S!" also demonstrates our excellent spelling skills.
2. Whether or not it qualifies as its own genre is debatable, but there are quite a few songs devoted to making fun of freshmen. In one song titled "The Freshman's Lament" (1914), Jumbos sang: "I wonder when my mustache will come through / and, soon I hope, indeed you bet I do. / Before another year it will surely appear, / And then my dream of whiskers will come true." Poor, whiskerless froshies…
3. It also appears that a repressed desire to drink invaded many of our song lyrics in the early 20th century. The classic "Brown and Blue" (1889) describes the way Tufts students dealt with the stress of school and includes such lyrics as "Let our spirits rise tonight, / Let our hopes be warm and bright, / We will banish sadness with our song… / Then let us fill the cup of youth / And drain its sparkling joys." Perhaps it's just the English major in me, but I get the feeling that "draining the cup of youth" could have been a euphemism for something else.
4. Finally, some of the true Ivy Book gems simply provide a sense of what students really thought of Tufts in the 1900s. I think my favorite song, by far, is the masterpiece titled "We're Going to Skip College" (1915). It goes a little something like this: "We're going to skip college tomorrow, / We're going to skip college tomorrow, / We're going to skip college tomorrow, / And we'll never go back anymore."
And as I sit here proofreading this column at an embarrassingly late hour of the night, I have to admit that this suggestion is all too tempting.
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