OXFORD, Miss. — It took seven years, but the University of Mississippi has a substitute for a beloved and reviled mascot who brought the Confederacy to mind. The new guy is still a rebel, only cuddlier.
“Rebel Black Bear” won 62 percent of the vote in a final poll, the school announced Thursday. Its athletic programs will keep the Rebels nickname.
It has been more than a decade since Ole Miss began stripping away its images of the Old South. Confederate battle flags were first to go. Next was mascot “Colonel Reb,” the goateed Southern planter who cheered on the Rebels from the sidelines since 1979.
Tradition dies hard in Oxford, where tens of thousands of fans turn out in ties and sundresses on fall Saturdays for elaborate tailgate parties in “The Grove” before football games. An unofficial motto is: “We may lose a game, but we never lose a party.”
Picking a replacement became a matter of statewide import and the subject of online pranks, such as the suggestion of a “rebel” from the Star Wars movies, Admiral Ackbar.
In the end, the smiling black bear inspired in part by longtime Oxford resident William Faulkner won out, defeating two other nominees. One was the “Rebel Land Shark,” based on the “fins up” hand motion started by late football player Tony Fein.
The other was “Hotty Toddy,” a gray human-like character who aimed to personify a school cheer that begins: “Are you ready? Hell yes! Damn right! Hotty Toddy, gosh almighty!”
“I know there were a lot of people emotionally invested in Colonel Reb and everybody might not completely agree with the bear, but I think everyone can be proud of how our students went about the process,” said Sparky Reardon, the university’s dean of students.
Margaret Ann Morgan, a co-chairman of the student mascot selection committee, said the bear was recommended because it had a Mississippi connection, would appeal to children and would be unique to the Southeastern Conference.
The black bear is connected to Ole Miss through Faulkner, the Nobel Prize-winning novelist who penned “The Bear.” In it, Old Ben stands as a symbol of pride, strength and toughness. The tale of the “teddy bear” originated with the story that President Teddy Roosevelt refused to shoot a bear on a Mississippi hunt in 1902.
More than 13,000 eligible voters voted in the final poll.
Some of the colonel’s faithful staged protests this year and attempted to derail the search for a new mascot in the past few weeks by gathering signatures to make Colonel Reb one of the choices.
“I think it’s hypocrisy. I think the fans of Ole Miss still want Colonel Reb. We have a petition with 3,500 signatures of students who still want Colonel Reb as their mascot and that’s the way it should be,” said Brian Ferguson, a 2007 graduate who is a member of the Colonel Reb Foundation.
Brittany Garth, a student from Dallas, said she wished the school didn’t have a mascot.
“I just think it’s kind of dumb. Why is our mascot a bear when we’re the Rebels? . . . None of the three choices made any sense,” Garth said.
