There’s no one quite like Joe Vandal.
The University of Idaho’s mascot is the only “Vandal” representing a college in the country.
Joe was inspired by former Idaho Head Basketball Coach Hec Edmundson’s 1917 basketball team, the Vandal Athletics website notes.
The team’s defense played so intensely, sports writers — like The Argonaut’s Harry Lloyd “Jazz” McCarty — said they had “vandalized” their opponents.
“The opening game with Whitman will mark a new epoch in Idaho basketball history, for the present gang of ‘Vandals’ have the best material that has ever carried the ‘I’ into action,” wrote McCarty after the game.
In 1921, Edward Maslin Hulme, the then dean of the UI College of Liberal Arts, worked with McCarty to have Vandals adopted as the official nickname for Idaho teams.
Bill Currie was the first to don a Joe Vandal suit six decades ago, Kindra Meyer wrote in a 1997 Argonaut article. Currie and his mother created the first Vandal head using papier-mache in 1956.
“Basically I would run around hugging girls in the crowd,” Currie said in Meyer’s article.
In 1997, he returned to UI’s campus for the homecoming football game.
Courtesy | Idaho Athletics
Currie was joined by some of his fraternity brothers — members of Sigma Alpha Epsilon Fraternity’s 1956 to 1959 graduating classes.
Currie passed away on Nov. 27, 2012. However, his spirit lives on in all the Joe Vandals who’ve followed him.
The Vandal suit has encountered a variety of changes over time.
According to the Vandal Athletics website, the traditional costume was replaced with an inflatable suit in the early 2000s. But the change was not well received, and fans were delighted when the suit was ceremonially deflated to reveal the traditional costume underneath.
In the past two generations of Joe Vandals, there have been two people to take on the role in order to put less stress on one person to go to every event where the mascot is requested.
The opportunity is listed as a work-study job, which is how one of the current Joe Vandals — UI student Nathan Noble — learned about it.
“I have one friend in particular who gets really excited about Joe Vandal,” Noble said. “Last year, I was looking through the work-study jobs that were offered, and Joe Vandal was one of them, and she said, ‘You have got to do this, I will be mad if you don’t do this.’”
Noble took on the role.
He said he loves how excited people become when they see Joe Vandal, running up to take pictures and say hello to him.
“I have very little visibility area, so when little children see me and run up, sometimes I won’t even see them coming,” Noble said. “I’ll just feel — whap — right up against my leg, hugging me, and I think, ‘What’s that? Oh, someone showed up and decided to give me a hug.’ It’s great.”
Noble will once again take on the role of Joe this weekend, participating in the parade, tailgating events and, of course, the football game.
Deborah hudson
My daughter was joe vandal in the 1992-1994 time period. It was a well kept secret then so people didnt know who was wearing the costume and she was the only Joe Vandal and went to all the games.