Flashback
30 years ago
Shenanigans
Shenanigans offered students a chance to engage in some “fun-filled frolicking.” Photo: Thomas Buchanan
Early in the fall semester of 1980, a general invitation went out to anyone who was “tired of all the competition the university brings” to participate in a couple of hours of “fun-filled frolicking.” Scheduled for a Friday afternoon, Shenanigans was billed as an opportunity to join together in an “exuberant spirit of active enjoyment” and to make new friends.
With assistance from staff from Sub-Board 1 and Student Affairs, the event was organized by Lois Waldman, director of the University Union Activities Board Coffeehouse, who described it as “a great way to end the summer and an even better way to begin the fall.” Jack Baker of the physical education program coordinated such antics as fitting “mass quantities of bodies into a hula hoop.”
All members of the university community were invited, and while neither the weather—good—nor the price—free—should have discouraged attendance, only about 150 students showed up in front of Clark Gym on the South Campus.
As reported by the Spectrum, activities included forming a giant circle with students sitting on one another’s laps, forming “a ring of 32 people trying to use each other to get up from the ground” and “Pirate Gathering,” where onlookers were pulled into the fun. The festivities ended with the formation of a giant human pyramid.
—John Edens, University Archives
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