By sticking with its Tiger logo, Trinity University is listening to alumni and honoring its unique history, our guest columnist writes.
Betsy Gerhardt Pasley
Credit where it is due, Trinity University listened to its alumni after introducing a new logo that was less than popular, our guest columnist writes.
Billy Calzada/Staff Photographer
I see Trinity University, my beloved alma mater, has made the front page of the Express-News again (“Trinity backs off new logo after backlash,” Aug. 6). One writer even included a fleeting reference to the logo controversy in his letter to the editor that same day.
After more than 30 years in corporate life, I’ve experienced and been involved in multiple logo and branding updates. Few were widely applauded, and many stakeholders took time to adapt. In this case, I’m proud of the alumni passion in their feedback and appreciate that the school listened.
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As someone who has tracked more than 150 years of Trinity sports, I’m comforted the university is keeping the Trinity Tiger logo intact.
This brings me to the all-important subject of team names. My favorites have always been those that are geographically or historically relevant, like Roadrunners (University of Texas at San Antonio), Buckeyes (Ohio State University), or Sooners (University of Oklahoma). Minor league baseball is rife with memorable nicknames, like Amarillo’s Sod Poodles and our own San Antonio Missions.
During the past few years, I’ve stumbled over some fun mascot backstories. For example, I discovered that Libby Johnson, my Trinity coach in the 1970s, played tennis for the Pied Pipers in Hamlin in West Texas. Only later did I learn the name came from the 1284 story of a pied piper who led rats out of the German town of Hamelin.
Also, my research into the rise of women’s intercollegiate sports right after Title IX unearthed awkward naming attempts as schools stood up their new women’s varsity teams. Some early examples were Tigerettes (Trinity), Bearettes (Baylor University), Ladyjacks (Stephen F. Austin State University) and Bruinettes (University of California, Los Angeles).
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Not all of the players approved of these nicknames.
In 1978, Trinity volleyball player Suzy Gray wrote to the student newspaper, “We are not a drill team or a pep squad. … We are an athletic team representing Trinity University. The Trinity mascot is the Tiger, not the Tigerette.” She added, “P.S. If you met up with a female tiger while in a deep, dark jungle, would you take the time to call her a tigerette?”
The most cringeworthy attempt was when Southwest Texas State experimented with “Bobkittens.” Now called Texas State, the school has joined others in merely adding “Lady” in front of the mascot — Lady Bobcats.
But one interesting historic fact changed my mind about Trinity’s Tiger, which I always felt was a lazy generic name, like all of the Panthers, Cougars, Pumas and Lions out there.
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Instead, events in 1916 in Waxahachie put that nickname into historic context. Trinity was on its second campus 47 years after its founding but didn’t have its own baseball field. Instead, the team competed on the town’s municipal diamond.
When the major league Detroit Tigers held its spring training at the same site, city leaders and Trinity players eagerly engaged with the big leaguers.
The city expressed its appreciation by renaming the facility “Tiger Field,” and Trinity players began referring to themselves as the Tigers — thankfully replacing the monikers of the “Presbyterians” or “Trinitonians” previously bestowed on them by local media.
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As a fan of baseball and Trinity, this historic tidbit makes me smile. Maybe there will be a happy ending to this logo thing after all.
Betsy Gerhardt Pasley is a retired corporate communicator from San Antonio. She was one of the first female athletes to earn a varsity letter at Trinity University and was the first female sportswriter at the San Antonio Light.
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