Legend has it, a Navy ship had a goat on it... the goat expired at sea... officers preserved the skin so it could be mounted.. Two young ensigns were entrusted with the skin, but first they decided to swing by and watch the US Naval football game. At halftime, one of 'em dressed up in the skin, the crowd loved it, Navy won............ thus, tradition started.
1893, Midshipmen from the USS New York gave their live goat (El Cid) to the Navy football team as a gift... Navy beat Army that day 6-3, the formal tradition (live goat mascot) began. In the early 1900's, after the Midshipment whooped up again on Army, the goat was led on a victory lap all about the train and didn't scoot until they reached Baltimore. Twas there, formally donned "Bill."
Currently, Bill XXXVI is the 39th mascot and the 36th 'Bill'.
Don't mess with Bill, no no no no no, don't mess with Bill - leave my Billy alone.
Army didn't pay no heed. Band camp, 1953, one week before the Army-Navy football game.. Thanks to inside skinny from a Westpoint cadet (exchange student at the time at the Naval Academy) cadets from the US Military Academy spotted the goat behind the stadium.. stashed him in their convertible.. .put the top down... they ALMOST got away with it, but, as they were refueling the car, the goats horns punctured the convertible top. People seen it. (Don'tya hate it when people say "seen it" like that? I kinda like it actually!) They did make it back to campus... presented 'Bill' to the Corps at a raucous dinnertime pep rally (To be continued, heap long paragraph, sorry)
So.......... It got ba-aa-aa-aa-ad. The Midshipmen refused to go to class until they got Bill back, Officials from USMA (including President Dwight D. Eisenhower, himself a USMA grad) ordered Bill's return. Army cadets complied, BUT, held a mass protest rally on campus, deemed by NY papers as "Goat Rebellion At West Point." Army, and actually Navy too, ba-aa-aa-aa-aa-ad taste in their mouths... Army prevailed 20-7.
Holy guacamole, Bill has been stolen at least ten times, mostly by the Army dudes, but the Air Force Acadamy has done so too. The Navy guys have taken their mascot stealing turns as well, running off with Army's mules on multiple occasions.
It's gotten so ba-aa-aa-aa-ad, in 1992, they enacted formal agreement NOT TO STEAL EACH OTHERS MASCOTS after Navy took a mule, cut phone lines and zip tied 9 Army employees. That don't stop those kids, ha. Ba-aa-aa-aa-ad joke, sorry.
Most heists are shortlived, the animals are returned, but one year, not the case. Bill was gone for quite some time. In fact, an ad ran in the New York Times that read "Hey Navy, do you know where your 'kid' is today? The Corps does."
1965, five cadets, ready to steal Bill, but....... first.. they had two of their girlfriends drive up to the two Marines that were guarding Bill's pen. The gals spoke of being "lost... and stood up by our blind dates.".. Attention was diverted long enough, yep, Bill stolen, taken back to West Point.
Them dadgum Cadets, they did it again in 2007. This time, they went to the 'home' where retired Bills lived. They actually filmed themselves kidnapping Bill XXXII, Bill XXXIII and Bill XXXIV then had the damn gall to post it all on YouTube.. so much as saying, "We ba-aa-aa-aa-aa-ad."
Stolen from some dadgum site (sorry, I ain't sure how to do, write that properly):
"On December 5, 1991, 17 Naval Academy midshipmen, two advisors and a Maryland mule farmer snuck onto the campus of their eternal rival, the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, to kidnap West Point’s beloved mascots: four one-thousand-pound mules. What happened next was the culmination of nearly a year of meticulous planning that cemented those midshipmen in the annals of U.S. Naval Academy lore — and may have contributed to the Navy pummeling West Point in their annual Army-Navy football game the next day.
“Our jaws just hit the ground,” said Dan Goldenberg, a 1992 Naval Academy graduate who was at the pep rally when the raiding party made their triumphant return atop the captured mules."
The cat's got my goat, or tongue, or sumpin. I got myself in to this mascot stealing mess, I ain't real sure how to get out, end it, but... it ain't a ba-aa-aa-aa-ad time to do so.
Have a great day, hug a loved one, or a goat, or a mule.
Love, Victurd.
(Overtime, extra innings, whatever ya call it. I've probably told this before, ie, ah, a Senior Moment. I finally had the nerve to ask a gal that, for a long, long, long time, I thought was maybe the most beautiful woman I'd ever seen, out for a date. Actually, to play pickleball, I'd heard she never had, wanted to... TBC
"Sure" (enter YIPEEEEEEE here!) She lived on a farm along with horses, ponies, mules, feral cats and goats. No lions and tiger and bears though. "But... my goat is having a 'kid' any time, so, just know that upfront, I might have to stay and assist at birth."
Happened. As I pulled up, she was all beautified, she always was, but.. she was in the barn helping the birth of the goat. She'd harkened her sister to take over, as she thought "maybe two" after the first was successfully delivered. So, we went to play pickleball.
When she jumped in the car, I noticed a half inch square chunk of 'afterbirth' in her hair. I never said nuttin. Still gorgeous by my book. Couple games of pickleball, nope, never knocked it outta her hair.
She was somewhat humiliated when I told her about it a couple years later. Really, I didn't think she looked ba-aa-aa-aa-ad at all.)
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