Name-a-Day Calendar, November 25: Ball State Cardinals
Page 19 of 365
Chosen in: 1927
Chosen by: Athletic Director Paul “Billy” Williams in a name-the-team contest
Ball State University was founded in 1918 as the “Indiana State Normal School – Eastern Division”, which sounds more like an athletic conference than a school. They began intercollegiate athletic competition a couple years later as the Hoosieroons.1 You know “Hoosier” as the demonym for Indiana; “Hoosieroons” are their young children, as coined by John Finley in his popular 1830 poem “The Hoosier’s Nest”.
For whatever reason, the school only used this name for about seven years before deciding it didn’t suit them. They held a contest to pick a new nickname and offered $5 in gold to whoever submitted the winning entry.2 Then-Athletic Director Paul “Billy” Williams got in on the contest himself, which…c’mon, that’s gotta be a conflict of interest, right? He submitted “Cardinals” because he remembered watching the St. Louis Cardinals and noted that the cardinal on Rogers Hornsby’s sweatshirt was unique.3 It was put to a student body vote along with three other entries – “Indians”,4 “Delawares”,5 and the original moniker “Hoosieroons” – and it won in a landslide victory, receiving 234 votes to their 122, 77, and 37, respectively.
You can read all about this contest in the December 2, 1927, edition of the student newspaper, The Easterner. The relevant article is on page 6, but the whole thing is a fun time capsule of a read. Check it out here.
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Fun fact (and spoiler for March 6, 2023): Indiana University didn’t start calling themselves the “Hoosiers” (or, more correctly, the “Scrapping Hoosiers”) until 1923. Ball State beat them to it!
$85.29 in 2022 dollars
Rogers Hornsby played for the Cardinals through 1926 but was gone in 1927. This contest was held in November, so that cardinal must have made a real impression on Mr. Williams to stick with him for well over a year.
Hats off to the wide majority of students for rejecting this nickname.
Ball State University is located in Delaware County, Indiana.