Sabrina ( /səˈbraɪnə/ sə-BRY-nə) is a 300-pound bronze statue owned by Amherst College. Since it was donated to the College in 1857, the statue has been the subject of numerous pranks and has changed hands between the college administration and various student groups many times. Traditionally, members of even year and odd year classes have battled for possession of the statue.
In 1857, Amherst College accepted a gift from Joel Hayden, future Lieutenant Governor of Massachusetts—a bronze neoclassical sculpture by William Calder Marshall named after Sabrina, Goddess of the Britons. The statue was originally installed on the town side of the Amherst campus, between North Dormitory and the Octagon. [1]
It was not long before the scantily-clad Sabrina attracted the attention of the then all-male Amherst students. Around 1860, an industrious Amherst student, in the first of many Sabrina-inspired pranks, stole a set of undergarments from one of the nearby female colleges and used them to clothe Sabrina. The college administration harshly reprimanded the student. The next morning, Sabrina appeared with a dent in her cheek, apparently inflicted by a blow from an axe. [1]
This first incident of chicanery inspired a series of other pranks. Between 1870 and 1880 students painted the statue several times, typically alternating between white and black. [1] The class of 1877 stole Sabrina and kept her for nearly a week before returning her. In 1878 she was transported to the roof of the Octagon building, where she was found holding a doll emblazoned "'81." The class of 1882 stole the statue to make her the guest of honor at a class banquet, a theme that was to become a recurring pattern in Sabrina pranks. The class of 1883 threw the statue down the college well, from which the administration had considerable difficulty extracting her. [1]
These early pranks typically pitted students against the college administration, making Sabrina an object of some controversy. In 1884, the statue was nearly destroyed when President Julius Hawley Seelye, frustrated with the pranks the statue inspired, ordered a college groundskeeper to destroy her. The groundskeeper, however, was too moved by the statue's beauty to carry out the orders and instead hid her underneath a haystack in his barn. The statue was recovered on June 19, 1887, when members of the class of 1890, motivated by rumors that the statue had not been destroyed, snuck into the barn at night, found the statue, and carted her off in a wheelbarrow. [1]
The tradition of odd- and even-year class members competing for possession of the statue began in earnest in 1891. The sophomore class 1893 brought Sabrina out of hiding to attend their class banquet and kept her stored safely in Boston. Yet when members of the class of 1894 caught wind of plans to bring her back to campus, one of them traveled to Springfield to intercept the package, impersonating the statue's owners and convincing the clerk to send her back to Boston under his own care. This trickery resulted in a warrant being issued for the student's arrest, at which point he boarded a steamer for Europe to wait "for the excitement to die out." [1]
The statue remained under the control of even-year classes through 1910, when senior Max Shoop compiled and published a brief history of the pranks involving the statue. [1] Sabrina remained a topic of significant interest at the college and beyond, generating an article in the New York Times about the statue's history in 1910, [2] and another book on her history in 1921, [3] as well as a brief New York Times notice about her appearance at a baseball game in 1922. [4] Particularly notable was an appearance in 1919 that resulting in "a car chase, gun fire and a car accident that left a number of students injured." [5]
In 1934 the statue was returned to the college, where she was installed in the memorabilia room. She was subject to many failed attempts at theft (including by students from Amherst's rival Williams College) and several acts of vandalism, including a decapitation in 1941. (Her head was welded back in place shortly thereafter.) The administration attempted to discourage further thefts by falsely claiming that the statue had been filled with concrete and welded to its base. [6] [7]
She remained in place until 1951, when members of the graduating class, suspecting the statue was in fact hollow, used a torch to detach Sabrina from her base and steal her again. [5] This theft and the later appearance of the statue flying over a college baseball game the following fall generated an article in Life magazine article about the tradition in 1952. [8]
The class of 1951 subsequently returned the statue to the college, where she remained for over 20 years, until students staged a high-profile heist in 1977. In June 1977 the statue was displayed at the 25th reunion of the class of 1952 in order to raise donations for the college. The class required that the statue be placed on display, however, so she was mounted behind plexiglass in Converse Hall. In the early hours of October 13, three masked students entered the hall, tied up the switchboard operator, and pried the statue loose. [9] At the last minute the students enlisted Prince Albert Grimaldi (then a student at the college) so they could claim diplomatic immunity if necessary. [10] They were apprehended less than a month later, when campus police, having learned of their plan to fly the statue over a football game, staked out the local airports. [9]
The statue became the subject of some controversy after the college became coed, as some argued that the statue's tradition was inconsistent with the desire to become a more diverse, progressive institution. [11]
The statue was stolen again in 1984 by Bruce Becker (class of 1980) and Rosanne Haggerty (class of 1982) and made two more flights over Amherst athletic events. [12] The statue was returned to the college by Bruce Angiolillo (class of 1974) in 1994 for the inauguration of Tom Gerety as president of the college. [13] She remained securely kept by the college, occasionally displayed for alumni events, for well over a decade.
Subject: SABRINA HAS ESCAPED
Select fellow members of the class of 2008:
This email has been sent to 50 hand-picked members of the class of 2008. We ask for your assistance in a matter of the greatest importance.
As our time as Amherst undergraduates comes to a bittersweet close, we are not quite ready to let it go just yet--such a small community is not easily left behind. Therefore we find ourselves, in these final days, wishing for a capstone occasion for class-wide collaboration, collective spirit, and yes, a little mischief. And so we write to you with a proposition:
As many of you may know, Amherst was blessed long ago with the protection and guidance of the river goddess Sabrina. In 1857 the governor of Massachusetts bestowed a bronze statue of the water nymph upon the College on the Hill, and since that time she has excited generations of Amherst students, inspiring legendary battles between odd year classes and even year classes over her custody. During one year, she was dangled over the campus in a plane; another year, she was held out of a passing train, causing athletes to drop their equipment in the middle of a game, and charge after the elusive statue.
Sabrina's ventures, however, were recently halted. Several years ago, she was returned to the College administration, who hid her away in dark and secret location, bringing her into daylight for only the occasional class reunion. This neglect has no doubt saddened our fair protectress, and even worse, we fear she has begun to slip from the collective memory of Amherst undergraduates. You will surely agree that she hardly deserves such a fate, and so we are certain that you will be excited by the news we bring today:
SABRINA HAS BEEN LIBERATED!
The plan is this:
This Friday, May 9, is our last day of class as Amherst students, and it is also the day of our senior dinner and assembly. As such, it is the perfect occasion to celebrate the fact that the class of 2008 has liberated Sabrina, but we need your help to pull it off. Imagine the following: Friday morning, the Amherst community awakes to find painted posters inside Keefe and outside Val, proclaiming the liberation of Sabrina. Sidewalk chalk scrawled throughout campus reads "Where is she? Liberated! -Class of 2008." Flyers are posted on bulletin boards everywhere, showing pictures of Sabrina, free of her confines, and messages celebrating her escape. Students enter Valentine to find copies of the History of Sabrina beside the day's New York Times. Even the public computers on campus have had their boring old wallpaper replaced by pictures of Sabrina. (Anyone have connections with IT?) And so on--suggestions are welcome.
For those of you who are willing to help out in the early hours Friday morning (distributing a few flyers, painting a sign, writing on sidewalks, or any other ideas you may have) reply to this email as soon as possible. We will orchestrate the efforts from here, and we're confident that together our class can turn this occasion into one hell of a memory. Please pass this email along and invite fellow members of 2008 to participate, or invite members of our fellow even year class, 2010, to help out. But please, DO NOT breath a word of the endeavor to either the College faculty or to members of odd-year classes. The better we can keep these plans under wraps until Friday, the more impressive the roll-out will be. Needless to say, those of you who are willing to help out will be first in our minds when we organize a secret meeting between Sabrina and the members of our class.
Again, we want to reiterate how great these four years have been, and we are optimistic that Friday will be the perfect way to top it all off. But we can only make it happen with your help. Who's in?
Yours,
'08
The tradition was renewed in 2008, when several members of the graduating class stole the statue from its secure location on campus. Despite rumors that the statue was locked in the college's military bunker, one of the students had seen the statue returned to the basement of a college dormitory after the reunion festivities of 2007. In late April 2008, the students staged a fake poker game in the basement of the dormitory; while two kept a lookout at the building's entrances, a third picked the lock to the basement storage room, and a fourth student backed a getaway car up to the dorm's loading dock. The heist was completed in under 20 minutes, and the statue was promptly transported to Vassar College, where it was left in the dorm room of a student's girlfriend.
On May 7, 2008, an email was sent to many members of the class of 2008 soliciting their involvement in an elaborate senior prank. The students used a private Facebook account to organize efforts and share photos and information.
The graduating class answered the call admirably. On May 9 posters and decorations were put up and festivities were held across campus, including a live rendition of "The Sabrina Song" and a giant poster in the dining quad. During the college's "Senior Night" celebrations that evening, President Anthony Marx gave the following speech, with campus police officers standing beside him.
Good evening.
Tonight I was planning to talk about what a wonderful class you are, class of 2008. You are, indeed, the best and most brilliant class in the history of Amherst College. That, however, is not what I am going to talk about. Instead, I am going to talk about something else entirely. As you know, some group of you in this room has stolen my nymph, and I WANT HER BACK! From the theory of political science, many of you will be familiar with the concept of the monopoly of force. Let us make one thing perfectly clear. On this campus, the monopoly of force is ME.
Now I have thought long and hard about how to respond to this affront. I considered many possible retaliations. I have considered locking all the doors to this hall. I have considered beseeching you to bring her back, pleading with you for her return. I have even considered refusing to grant diplomas to the entire class of 2008 until the Sabrina is back in my possession.
In the end, however, I will do none of these things. Instead, I will pose a simple request: take care of her. In years past she has been thrown into wells, she has been battered, she has had her limbs torn off by people in your position. They have actually removed her limbs. Please do not do the same.
I say to you the following: We are looking forward to negotiations. In the mean time, I would greatly appreciate weekly photos of Sabrina, posed with a copy of a daily newspaper, so I know she is in good hands. And over the course of these next two weeks, as you conclude your final exams, enjoy your final hours as Amherst undergraduates. I leave you with the following: let the games begin. And have a wonderful night.
Thank you.— Anthony Marx, as transcribed by a student present
The statue was kept in hiding for five years. During that period, her guardians had her carefully restored by the Polich Tallix art foundry in New Windsor, New York. Over the years the statue's hand had been broken off, her foot was sheared off at the ankle, and her head remained only precariously attached by brackets. The students contacted Bruce Becker, who had stolen Sabrina in 1984 and had since procured a mold of the statue. The foundry used that mold to reconstruct the statue's hand and foot, which were then reattached. The statue's cracked neck was reinforced with fiberglass and epoxy. The guardians also commissioned a wheeled base for Sabrina to aid in her transportation and display.
The statue was returned to the college in 2013, during five-year reunion of the class of 2008, where, in homage to the tradition's early days, she was displayed at the class banquet for student photos. At the end of the evening, the class returned the statue to the college. After less than two hours, Sabrina was stolen from the college police station by the ten-year reunion class of 2003. It remained in their possession for less than an hour, when the class of 2014 tricked the 2003s into helping carry her off the dance floor and into a getaway car. Sabrina's whereabouts are currently unknown.
We may sing of our glorious college,
Of the old chapel steps and the bell,
Of the class-rooms just filled full of knowledge,
Which all Amherst men love so well.
But to-night as we're gather'd together,
Let us raise a strain loudly and strong
To her from whom naught can us sever,
To her who keeps watch o'er our throng.
Sabrina, fair, Sabrina, dear,
We raise to thee our hearty cheer,
Come fellows, all, and give a toast
To her we love, and love the most. [1]
Minerva is the Roman goddess of wisdom and strategic warfare and the sponsor of arts, trade, and strategy. From the second century BC onward, the Romans equated her with the Greek goddess Athena, though the Romans did not stress her relation to battle and warfare as the Greeks did.
Radcliffe College was a women's liberal arts college in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and functioned as the female coordinate institution for the all-male Harvard College. It was also one of the Seven Sisters colleges, among which it shared with Bryn Mawr College, Wellesley College, Smith College, and others the popular reputation of having a particularly intellectual, literary, and independent-minded female student body. Radcliffe conferred Radcliffe College diplomas to undergraduates and graduate students for the first 70 or so years of its history and then joint Harvard-Radcliffe diplomas to undergraduates beginning in 1963. A formal "non-merger merger" agreement with Harvard was signed in 1977, with full integration with Harvard completed in 1999. Today, within Harvard University, Radcliffe's former administrative campus is home to the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study, and former Radcliffe housing at the Radcliffe Quadrangle has been incorporated into the Harvard College house system. Under the terms of the 1999 consolidation, the Radcliffe Yard and the Radcliffe Quadrangle retain the "Radcliffe" designation in perpetuity.
Smith College is a private, independent women's liberal arts college with coed graduate and certificate programs in Northampton, Massachusetts. It is the largest member of the Seven Sisters. In its 2018 edition, U.S. News & World Report ranked it tied for 11th among the best National Liberal Arts Colleges. Smith is also a member of the Five Colleges Consortium, which allows its students to attend classes at four other Pioneer Valley institutions: Mount Holyoke College, Amherst College, Hampshire College, and the University of Massachusetts Amherst.
The University of Massachusetts Amherst is a public research and land-grant university in Amherst, Massachusetts. It is the flagship campus of the University of Massachusetts system. UMass Amherst has an annual enrollment of approximately 1,300 faculty members and more than 30,000 students. It was ranked 26th best public university and 70th best national university by U.S. News Report in 2019.
The Goddess of Democracy, also known as the Goddess of Democracy and Freedom, the Spirit of Democracy, and the Goddess of Liberty, was a 10-metre-tall (33 ft) statue created during the Tiananmen Square protests of 1989. The statue was constructed in only four days out of foam and papier-mâché over a metal armature. The constructors decided to make the statue as large as possible to try to dissuade the government from dismantling it: the government would either have to destroy the statue—an action which would potentially fuel further criticism of its policies—or leave it standing. Nevertheless, the statue was destroyed on June 4, 1989, by soldiers clearing the protesters from Tiananmen square. Since its destruction, numerous replicas and memorials have been erected around the world, including in Hong Kong, San Francisco and Washington, D.C..
The Princeton Reunions are an annual college reunion event held every year on the weekend before commencement at Princeton University. Known simply as "Reunions", this event brings back to campus upwards of 25,000 alumni and guests for a four-day celebration featuring large outdoor tents, elaborate costumes, sporting events, alumni and faculty presentations, fireworks, and bands from rock to swing.
Wilhelmina "Minnie" Vautrin was an American missionary, diarist, educator and president of Ginling College. She was a Christian missionary in China for 28 years. She is known for the care and protection of as many as ten thousand Chinese refugees during the Nanking Massacre in China, at times even challenging the Japanese authorities for documents in an attempt to protect the civilians staying at her college.
Campbell University is a private university in Buies Creek, North Carolina. Founded in 1887 by a young Baptist minister, J.A. Campbell, the school today enrolls more North Carolinians than any other private university in the state of North Carolina.
Sabrina the Teenage Witch is an American sitcom based on the Archie Comics series of the same name. The show premiered on September 27, 1996, on ABC to over 17 million viewers in its "T.G.I.F." line-up.
North Shore High School is located in Glen Head, New York. It opened in September 1957 and graduated its first class in June 1958. The first principal was Dr. John French.
Souhegan Cooperative High School is a Coalition of Essential Schools high school located in Amherst, New Hampshire, in the United States. Students from Amherst and Mont Vernon attend Souhegan for 9th through 12th grades. There are about 800 students and 150 faculty members. The school was founded based on the work of Theodore R. Sizer, a former dean of the Harvard Graduate School of Education, a notable American education reform leader and the father of the Essential Schools movement. Notably, Souhegan's progressive reputation has been chronicled in the book Standards of Mind and Heart: Creating the Good High School by Tony Wagner, Peggy Silvia and Dr. Robert A. Mackin. Based on this history, the school was founded with the mission "Souhegan High School aspires to be a community of learners born of respect, trust and courage." The school name is derived from its proximity to the Souhegan River, which adjoins the school property. The word Souhegan comes from the Algonquin language, meaning "waiting and watching place".
The Santa Isabel College, is a Private, Roman Catholic College located in Ermita, Manila, in the Philippines. Founded on 24 October 1632. Santa Isabel College is one of the oldest colleges in the Philippines and in Asia. It is owned and operated by the nuns of the Daughters of Charity.
Dr. Lalit Goel is a Professor and the Head of the Division of Power Engineering at the School of Electrical and Electronic Engineering (EEE), Nanyang Technological University (NTU). He is a Senior Member of the IEEE and received the IEEE Power Engineering Society 's Outstanding Engineer Award in 2000. He is also concurrently the Dean of Admissions of the university.
Auburn University has several notable traditions, many related to its varsity teams, the Auburn Tigers.
Texas Tech University traditions are an important part of the culture of Texas Tech University.
I Am the College of William and Mary was written in 1945 by Dr. Dudley W. Woodbridge, esteemed professor (1927-1966) and inaugural dean of the revived Law School at the College of William & Mary in Williamsburg, Virginia. The narrative poem recounts William & Mary's historic legacy as the seventh oldest college in the English-speaking world.
Mary Ellen Tracy is the high priestess of the Church of the Most High Goddess, who was convicted in 1989 of a single misdemeanor count of running a house of prostitution in connection with the operation of the church, located in West Los Angeles, California. Tracy is a graduate of the University of Miami, cum laude in chemistry, did graduate work in chemistry at UCLA, and received her masters in Environmental Sciences/Chemistry from Portland State University.
The Caltech–MIT rivalry is a college rivalry between California Institute of Technology (Caltech) and Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), stemming from the colleges' reputations as the top science and engineering schools in the United States. The rivalry is unusual given the geographic distance between the schools, as well as its focus on elaborate pranks rather than sporting events.
Angie Epifano, a former student at Amherst College, gained widespread media attention and millions of page views after she wrote an essay on her personal experience of sexual assault that was published in the Amherst student newspaper, The Amherst Student. After the publication of her essay, Amherst College began investigating its sexual assault procedures, and women from other college campuses in the United States came forward to file federal complaints under Title IX and to form groups to reduce sexual assault on college campuses.
|title= (help)|title= (help)| Research |  | |
|---|---|---|
| Campus | ||
| Athletics | ||
| Student Life | ||
| People | ||
| Media | ||
| Miscellaneous | ||