The Intercollegiate Bureau of Academic Costume (IBAC) assigned Duquesne College a hood lining that was bright red with a Yale blue chevron no later than 1927, according to an IBAC list from that year. The Bureau used the term “Yale blue” to describe a dark blue shade. But in Academic Heraldry in America (1962), Kevin Sheard described the university’s hood lining as red with a pale azure reversed chevron. This seems to be erroneous, because in a 1969 list the IBAC described Duquesne’s hood lining as scarlet with a navy blue chevron – a very similar description to that of 1927. But not long thereafter, a 1972 IBAC list had inverted the chevron (as in the Sheard book), probably to avoid confusion with the hood for Hanover College, which was also scarlet with a navy blue chevron.

Because the Bureau used synonyms like “bright red” and “scarlet” to describe the same color, or “Yale blue” and “navy blue” to describe the same color, hood lining duplications of this sort occurred more often than they should have. In this case, Hanover’s hood lining (scarlet with navy blue chevron) was identical to Duquesne’s hood lining (bright red with Yale blue chevron). After the IBAC realized this error in the late 1960 or early 1970s, they inverted Duquesne’s chevron.