Reply #44: No, but my college did. Minn. State University/Mankato... [View All]

[MinnFats]

as it's called now.
Lo, these many years ago the mascot was "Indians."
Around the time of the siege of Wounded Knee a push was made to change the mascot and the 'traditionalists' came up with all the standard arguments for doing so.

But the idea took hold in part because of Mankato's history with American Indians....After the Dakota/White folks 'conflict' of 1862, military tribunals (hmmmm....interesting coincidence) sentenced more than 300 of the defeated Santee and Dakota to be hanged, including many that were clearly innocent of any crime....Abraham Lincoln himself demanded to review each case and commuted the sentences of all but 38. Even so, many of those still condemned had not participated in the war and some even helped white settlers get away from the conflict. Final chapter....the largest mass execution in U.S. history took place in Mankato. There used to be a little stone marker at the site of the execution. It's gone now.
(You can read an excellent account of the whole thing in Dee Brown's "Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee." Which, now that I think of it, should be required reading for all students of any type. Used to be everyone I knew had read it.)


MSU/Mankato finally saw the light and changed the name of the teams to 'Mavericks' and the mascot/symbol was changed to a wild horse. It was quite painless. The only cost was buying new uniforms and replacing some stationery, etc.
I'll bet most of the students there now don't even know about the controversy of nearly 30 years ago...Mankato for a time was a little Madison, a hotbed of radical ideas and a thriving local music scene.