April Fools!

In celebration of April Fool’s Day, we present to our readers two truths and a lie about Washington College history and tradition. See if you can guess which are which! Just for fun, the lie will contain a grain of truth!

1. Hazing of Freshmen: At one time, first-year students were made to dance around a 15-foot bonfire built in the middle of Campus Avenue in their pajamas after being paraded around town and performing a ‘snake dance’ in the center of Chestertown.
2. Rock & Roll Royalty: Frank Zappa’s father went to Washington College.
3. Library Rules: At one time, female students were not allowed to visit the library in the evenings unless they dressed in men’s clothing to avoid distracting male students from their work.

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Answers:

1. TRUE! This pajama parade was held in October 1931 and was described in vivid detail in an Elm article published on 10/31/31:
2. TRUE! Francis Vincent Zappa, Sr., born in Sicily but a resident of Baltimore, attended Washington College in 1926-1927. Although he received his degree from UNC Chapel Hill in 1930, he was an active student while at WAC, as the Humor editor at the Collegian, once the campus newspaper. While in North Carolina, he became known as a “strolling crooner” guitar player. He became an engineer and metallurgist and returned to Maryland to work at the Edgewood Arsenal chemical warfare facility at Aberdeen Proving Ground. This work, along with his guitar expertise, was an influence on his son Frank, a guitar virtuoso whose work often included references to germs, germ warfare, and the defense industry. Below, a photo of Frank Sr. with his colleagues at the Collegian, from the 1927 Pegasus. Frank is on the far left in the back row:
3. FALSE! ……However, female students were once prohibited entirely from using the library at night! In the very same Elm issue that contained the story of the pajama parade, an article by W. H. Danneberg blamed the unbridled mayhem occurring in the library in the evenings on the return of female students, who had previously been prohibited. Read on: