In 1975, students voted in a nonbinding referendum to call Stanford’s teams the Robber Barons, an insouciant reference to the university’s founder, Leland Stanford, who could more charitably be labeled a railroad magnate. The name was rejected.
“I think it’s kind of silly,” a university spokesman said at the time.
But that was the point. Stanford has always had a countercultural side. Now, as it is a more buttoned-up university with teams named the Cardinal (as in the color, like the Harvard Crimson) and innumerable Silicon Valley connections, the best place to find traces of the university’s insouciant ethos is the student-run band, which, in a nod to the institution’s full name, refers to itself as the Leland Stanford Junior University Marching Band.
“It really emphasizes the history of Stanford’s student body — intelligent but can cut loose,” the drum major Peter Adelson, a senior who is known as Sippycup, said of the band.
Founded in 1893, the Stanford band reorganized in 1963 to become student-run and became known for its scatter style of performance. Besides its special brand of organized chaos, the band is also well known for rushing the field before the end of Stanford’s 1982 rivalry game against California, in which the Golden Bears used five lateral passes on a kickoff return to earn a 25-20 victory.
The band still disputes that it interfered, stating on its website: “The game was over. His knee was down.”
During Stanford’s 55-17 drubbing of Arizona this month, the band could be found in a corner of the south end zone.
There were several dozen members of all ages (some were not even students), although the group skewed young and alternative. Each tuba had a different drawing on its bell: Felix the Cat, a marijuana leaf, Dr. Seuss’ Lorax, the Grateful Dead logo. What uniform there was riffed loosely on a cardinal vest and khakis. Adelson dressed as Anubis, the jackal-headed Egyptian god.
The band’s song selection tended toward classic rock and pop. After touchdowns, the band plays “All Right Now” by Free.
On the field were five Dollies — essentially cheerleaders, but do not tell the band that — and, of course, the band’s mascot, the Tree. Although the Tree is a reference to the tall redwood that gives Palo Alto its name, it follows no fixed design. Some years, it is evergreen; some years, deciduous. This year’s has hundreds of felt leaves, some with plaid or polka dot designs. Its eyelashes are long, its lips large and coral. (The woman who is playing the Tree this season declined to comment.)
The band’s chief time to shine is during its pregame show, which before the Arizona game winked at an already-notorious September performance by Kansas State’s band in which a field formation ostensibly intended to look like the USS Enterprise, the “Star Trek” spaceship, resembled male private parts.
The band’s rebelliousness is as evergreen as El Palo Alto and is deeply embedded in student life. It is worth noting that in 1975, the band opposed the Robber Barons sobriquet, preferring that teams be called the Stanford Trees.
After the pregame show was over, the band turned serious, lining up at midfield and spelling out USA before playing the national anthem as four ROTC cadets saluted.
