According to the 2 May 1910 edition of The Polytechnic of Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, graduates of the institute were using academic hoods by that date, but the way the article was written implied that this was a new tradition. In the article, the colors of Rensselaer’s hood lining are stated to be cherry and white, but no heraldic pattern is described.

The official academic hood lining design for the institute was first cited in a 1918 Encyclopedia Americana article on academic costume written by Gardner Cotrell Leonard, the Director of the Intercollegiate Bureau of Academic Costume (IBAC). Leonard stated that Rensselaer had been assigned a hood lining that was white with a bright red chevron. The IBAC no doubt employed the euphemistic “bright red” to describe Rensselaer’s chevron to avoid calling attention to the fact that this was essentially a copy of the hood linings of Western Reserve University and the Episcopal Theological School, which the IBAC had both assigned white with a scarlet chevron (although Western Reserve’s red was officially crimson).

A 1969 IBAC list described Rensselaer as having a white hood lining with a cherry red chevron – the correct description of the shade of the institute’s bright red – but a 1972 IBAC list interchanged Rensselaer’s colors (bright red with a white chevron), which must have been done in error.