 he challenge published by the
Agricultural and Mechanical College of Texas' student newspaper,
The Battalion, to retrieve their kidnapped mascot stung the pride
of the Rice student body. Indeed, the cadets promised to
parade the stuffed owl down the streets of Houston before, what
was then the annual Thanksgiving football game between the two
schools. For the newly established Rice Institute, this was
a humiliation too horrible to contemplate.
Rice students met quickly and formed the Owl
Protective Association (OPA) to answer the challenge. They
solicited funds and hired a detective to go immediately to College
Station to locate the missing mascot. When his mission
failed, two former A&M cadets enrolled at Rice led a small
band of their fellow students to the A&M campus in the middle
of the night. All were dressed as A&M upperclassmen, so
when they began a dorm-by-dorm surprise inspection, no one took
any particular notice. Daylight overtook them, however,
before they could complete their mission and they were forced to
return to Houston empty-handed.
Undaunted, the OPA hired another detective to
ferret out the owls hiding place. This detective, know only
to history as "Snowball," posed as a newspaper reporter
gathering information on the "owl-napping" for an
article. He soon befriended the original perpetrators and
learned that the bird was securely locked away in the armory (the
old Assembly Hall, see the November 1996 issue of Texas Aggie).
The OPA had already planned their raid on the A&M campus and
Snowball's telegram of the owl's location set the operation in
motion.
Seventeen Rice students, some in A&M
uniforms, departed from Houston on January 30, 1917 in a Hudson
Super-six and two Model T Fords.
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Reaching the campus around
11:30 that night, the group split up to commit various deeds of
mischief and foul play. The group charged with recapturing
the owl was soon trying to cut their way through the heavy door on
the third floor or the armory. The noise from the attempted
break-in quickly aroused the attention of a night watchman.
One of the Rice students departed through a window to diver the
attention of the watchman and the chase was on. As the
others in the raiding party were discovered, footraces took place
all over the campus. Since the most of the Rice students
were in some form of military guise, there was no general alarm
given for what seemed to be normal student pranks.
With campus security
officers busy chasing the various bands of miscreants, the armory
team battered down the heavy door, snatched the owl, dropped the
bird in the back of the Hudson and sped off into the night.
Once of the watchmen realized what was occurring and began firing
his .44 pistol in the air. The campus came alive and word of
the theft spread quickly among the cadets. Meanwhile the
group in the Hudson transferred the owl to the Fords, which then
headed for Houston as quickly as they could over the badly rutted
road to Navasota. The Hudson made an ill-fated return to the
campus to pick up two of their fellow students and enjoy one final
round of jeers and cheers.
As the Rice students motored back to Houston,
no doubt congratulating themselves on their success, their plan
began to unravel. The owl, at least the major portion of it,
would never make it back to Houston.
To be continued.
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