The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #103135   Message #2714165
Posted By: Joe_F
01-Sep-09 - 08:31 PM
Thread Name: Fraternity & Sorority Chants and Songs
Subject: RE: Fraternity & Sorority Chants and Songs
This does not strictly qualify, in that Caltech abolished fraternities in the 1930s (IIRC) and set up four student houses, into three of which it moved the three biggest fraternity chapters then existing, and into the fourth (Fleming House, to which I belonged from 1954 to 1958), the remaining smaller ones. The antiintellectualism reflected in this song, tho unlovely, was IMO a lesser evil than the cutthroat competition prevalent at some other prestigious colleges, against which it was fairly effective protection.

TTTO John Brown's Body.

On Caltech's dreary campus mid the iceplant and the smog,
There are things that often happen not found in the catalog.
Not everyone's a genius or an introverted queer,
For Fleming House is here.

    Fleming House is here to stay, boys,
    Just for college fun and play, boys.
    To the Institute's dismay, boys,
    Fleming House is here to stay.

Our teams bowl over others like a bowling ball does pins.
We have our share of laughter as we rack up all our wins.
Not one distinguished scholar, not a brilliant engineer,
For Fleming House is here.

(There may be another stanza, but if so, I have repressed it.)

Mention of the smog makes this a fairly recent composition in 1954.