INDIAN SYMBOL FELT

In the 1920s Boston sports writers nicknamed Dartmouth sports teams “the Indians.” This felt prototype, created in 1932 by Walter Beach Humphrey, class of 1914, was one of several unofficial mascots used for years. It made its way onto everything from neckties and T-shirts to key chains and other knickknacks. Humphrey, who found fame as an illustrator, also painted the politically incorrect Hovey murals in Thayer dining hall in the late 1930s. In 1972 the trustees declared the use of the Indian symbol “in any form to be inconsistent with present institutional and academic objectives.” (The murals have been covered since 1983.) The banning spawned outrage as many alums clung to their old symbol for years.