Note: This is an encore post from 2006.

Sept. 16, 1907
Los Angeles

Occidental’s fall semester has gotten underway with a boisterous gathering in the Hall of Letters. The first order of business was to punish underclassmen who dared to wear corduroy trousers, a right restricted to the upper classes. “Offending students were unceremoniously shorn of the ‘extreme pegs,’ ” The Times said. “ In the roughhouse, Dean Ward was among those who went to the floor.”

Next, the students gathered under banners of their home states and competed to see which group could sing down the others, with the Californians winning easily.

The Oxy students concluded the evening with a bonfire on the athletic field, as faculty and students made impromptu speeches. The students took off their ties and shirt collars, and any who refused were stripped of them in what The Times called “lively scrimmages.” The young men’s education had indeed begun.