Hamline University
Minnesota
1854
The Intercollegiate Bureau of Academic Costume (IBAC) assigned Hamline College a hood lining that was dark gray with a cardinal chevron no later than 1927, according to an IBAC list from that period. This description did not change in a 1948 Intercollegiate Bureau list. In Academic Heraldry in America (1962), Kevin Sheard followed the school’s official description of its colors and cited Hamline’s hood lining as gray with a red chevron.
Possibly to avoid confusion with a similar hood lining the IBAC had assigned to Stevens Institute of Technology (steel gray with a scarlet chevron), between 1962 and 1972 the Intercollegiate Bureau reassigned Hamline a dark gray hood lining with two cardinal chevrons. This was unnecessary, as the gray hood lining of Stevens Institute should have been silver gray (a light shade of gray), not steel gray (a medium shade of gray), and cardinal, not scarlet as assigned. So here Hamline has retained its original IBAC hood lining arrangement featuring a single chevron.
In 1890, the president of Hamline College appointed a committee of three students to select colors for the college. They recommended red and gray because they were an “attractive and harmonious” combination that would hide dirt and grass stains when used for athletic uniforms. The college’s red was a “true red”, like cardinal or crimson, and the shade of gray was dark. The committee’s recommendation was approved by the student body later in 1890.
Citations in the World Almanac (listed by cover date; color information is from the previous year): gray/red (1895-1907); red/gray (1908-1935)
