The 97th Hobo Day will be played against McNeese State next season

[cowbellnation]

http://www.gojacks.com/ViewArticle.dbml?DB_OEM_ID=15000&ATCLID=1351756

The next three Hobo Day dates have been finalized, as well as the entire football schedules completed for the 2008 and 2009 seasons at South Dakota State University.

Hobo Day 2008 is set for Oct. 4, when the Jackrabbits will host defending Southland Conference champion McNeese State (La.). SDSU previously played at McNeese State during the 2006 season, winning 20-17 after rallying for 14 points in the final five minutes of the game...

Northern Iowa will get to play in the 2009 Hobo Day
Youngstown State will get to play in the 2010 Hobo Day

[McNeese_beat]

Tell the uninformed (starting with me) what Hobo Day is all about

[JayJ79]

it's the SDSU version of Homecoming.


Hobo Day History
The date -- November 2, 1912.
The event -- the first Hobo Day at South Dakota State College.

In a world with so much emphasis placed on being fashionable, there occurs, one day out of the year, a time when everyone is allowed to dress in their dingiest and be proud of it.

Only the students, faculty and alumni of South Dakota State University know that this means one thing -- an annual extravaganza appropriately dubbed Hobo Day.

Hobo Day is said to have originated with several students eating ice cream and talking at a local drug store in 1912. The topic of conversation was a way to rescue the sagging school spirit, caused to some degree when State lost its first two football games of the season, 34-0 to Carleton and 73-7 to the University of South Dakota.

Many ideas of a homecoming day were brought up, but none were taken with any enthusiasm until someone mentioned an idea that had been attempted elsewhere (history is vague, with both the University of Mississippi and the University of Missouri as others who had attempted to use the Hobo theme). Although this idea wasn't very successful in other places, it did seem to hold some potential for South Dakota State.

Thus, the biggest one-day event in South Dakota was born.

Prior homecoming activities had featured a traditional "nightshirt parade" with a snake dance which led the students through the streets of Brookings until they arrived at the train depot in time to meet the night train.

That practice continued until one fall when the college authorities decided it undignified for women students to participate in this activity.

Thus the idea for any new tradition had to include the female students. Costumes conceived in 1912 had males dressed as hobos and girls as Indian maidens.

Even the first Hobo Day would prohibit the use of the razor. Student regulations that year stated that any man who shaved after the Monday morning preceding the festivities would be initiated into the Bull Moose Club with a barrel and an oak lathe. Girls had to wear their hair in a braid and anyone who failed to do so would be "painted with red ink and have their hair braided by the Big Chief's wife."

Students, dressed in costumes, assembled at the Old North Chapel before they marched to the depot to meet the Yankton College football team.

The Industrial Collegian reported: "At the rally, onlookers couldn't tell whether they were in an 1849 Indian village or a twentieth century division point of the Northwest railroad."

The parade started toward the train depot with a hobo band and the entire student body following to meet the Yankton team.

The first Hobo Day characters were "Old Doc Yac" and his supernatural medicine chest, and "Samanthy Jane," a suffragette from Chicago who flirted with every man in sight. She was dressed in faded blue calico, a black switch, red sunbonnet, football hose and No. 10 overshoes.

On the way back to campus, most students stopped at Brookings residents' back doors and "bummed" ingredients for Mulligan stew.

From the first Hobo Day, the event grew to a five-block parade in 1914 with the first float being "an amusing exhibit of an old delivery wagon."

The first royalty was chosen that year by student ballots, and the chrysanthemum was selected as the official flower.

The Blue Key Smoker started in 1936 to stimulate lagging enthusiasm and the Bummobile was donated in 1939.

Weary Willie made his first appearance in the 1950 Hobo Day parade, and Dirty Lil became an annual attraction starting in 1976.

Cavorts, a student talent show, was added in recent years.

Beginning with a 6-3 victory over Yankton College in the first Hobo Day football game, South Dakota State has a 54-33-5 record on Hobo Day. No game was played in 1918 because of World War I, and in 1943, two Army special training teams played to a 6-6 tie.

[spelunker64]

Nice group of games coming up for Hobo Day

[FCS Preview]

Nice group of games coming up for Hobo Day

One would think on Hobo day you'd rather play a bunch of bums. :D

[McNeese72]

http://www.gojacks.com/ViewArticle.dbml?DB_OEM_ID=15000&ATCLID=1351756

The next three Hobo Day dates have been finalized, as well as the entire football schedules completed for the 2008 and 2009 seasons at South Dakota State University.

Hobo Day 2008 is set for Oct. 4, when the Jackrabbits will host defending Southland Conference champion McNeese State (La.). SDSU previously played at McNeese State during the 2006 season, winning 20-17 after rallying for 14 points in the final five minutes of the game...

Northern Iowa will get to play in the 2009 Hobo Day
Youngstown State will get to play in the 2010 Hobo Day

Great!! From my discussions earlier this season on the SDSU messageboard, I was hoping our game would be on Hobo Day.

By the way, from your name, I assume the Cowboy fans can pack their cowbells and be assured that they will be allowed in the stadium?

Doc

[cowbellnation]

Well to answer your quetion Doc I think I'll let the bells answer for you.

From the start of this video

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PC-_-R2lOvk&feature=related

And at about the 5:14 mark of this video

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3sIR60Ho608&feature=related

[JohnStOnge]

One would think on Hobo day you'd rather play a bunch of bums. :D


Well, McNeese certainly played like a bunch of bums against Eastern Washington in the opening round of the playoffs.

Sorry fellow McNeese fans, I know that's harsh. But it's true. Eastern Washington got more yards and more first downs against McNeese than it got against any other team in 2007...including 5-6 NAIA Montana Western. The good news, to me, is that they were capable of a whole lot better. The bad news is that they didn't show up on their own home field with advancement in the playoffs on the line.

[McNeese75]

Well, McNeese certainly played like a bunch of bums against Eastern Washington in the opening round of the playoffs.

Sorry fellow McNeese fans, I know that's harsh. But it's true. Eastern Washington got more yards and more first downs against McNeese than it got against any other team in 2007...including 5-6 NAIA Montana Western. The good news, to me, is that they were capable of a whole lot better. The bad news is that they didn't show up on their own home field with advancement in the playoffs on the line.

xconfusedx John, do any of your children compete in sports or other activities? If so, and if they did not perform up to expectations, how would you feel about someone saying they played or performed like a bum?

It's not harsh, it just plain wrong xnonono2x