Homecoming History

Homecoming weekend is a time to gather together, host alumni, and showcase the University. It is a fun and exciting weekend. (See our special Homecoming Gifts.)

Alumni first began returning home for an official Homecoming in 1912. Since then, the celebration continues to entertain both young and old, with traditional events, including tailgate parties, fireworks, lawn displays.

Some of the excitement of Homecoming begins to stir, when students wonder who will reign as the Homecoming King and Queen. It has become not only an event, but also a legend at some colleges and universities since the early 1920s.

The title of King and Queen originated as merely a popularity contest, which some yearbooks hosted to raise funds. The football game was then included as part of the event. The Homecoming Pageant in the 1930’s and continued to build momentum which consisted of posting enlarged portraits of the Homecoming Queen and her court.

At one college the an annual Homecoming parade was added during the 1970s and 1980s to help unite the University campus. Winding its way to downtown the parade attracted a lot of attention from the public for the University's academic programs and athletic teams.

Publicity was also the reason behind some inaugural Homecoming football games in 1920’s. It was organized by one college president as a competition between graduate players and the current varsity team. He believed that a good college football team and an annual event to honor alumni would bring great attention to the college and build good relations.

Dartmouth kicks off its traditional Homecoming weekend with an evening of speeches, a parade, and, of course, the famous bonfire. For over one-hundred years, Dartmouth students, alumni, and administrators have reveled in the camaraderie, good cheer, and College spirit.
The origins of the Dartmouth Night Homecoming fire can be traced back over a century. In 1888, students from all four classes built a bonfire of cord from the forests around the college to celebrate a baseball victory over Manchester. 34-0. An editorial in the Daily Dartmouth criticized the fire, saying “It disturbed the slumbers of a peaceful town, destroyed some property, made the boys feel that they were being men, and in fact did no one any good.” Nevertheless, the idea remained popular and the bonfires continued informally, then the College officially recognized the fires.

Seven years after the fires began, the ceremony of Dartmouth Homecoming Night was introduced by President Jewett Tucker. On September 20th, 1895, the first Dartmouth Homecoming Night was held to celebrate the accomplishments of alumni of the College and, in Tucker’s words, “to promote class spirit.

Dartmouth Homecoming Night became part of President Tucker’s self-conscious effort to strengthen and deepen what he called the “Dartmouth Spirit.” Or, as he put it another time, it was a way to “capitalize the history of the College.”

Probably the most famous Dartmouth Homecoming Night occurred a century ago, in 1904 as William Heneage Legge, the Sixth Earl of Dartmouth and direct descendent of the British noble who provided most of the original capitalization for the College, visited the campus.

Thousands of alumni came to town for the event. The Earl’s visit on Dartmouth Homecoming Night was as a matter of course celebrated with an enormous bonfire, but the students were not content with the traditional fire alone. In order to make a vivid impression on the visiting Earl and his companion, the young Winston Churchill, the students formed a parade. The Earl took up the lead and the students, dressed in their pajamas, marched around the Green. The traditional herding of the freshmen around the bonfire was inaugurated.

Football first began to be associated with Dartmouth Homecoming Night in the early 1920s. Memorial Field was dedicated on Dartmouth Homecoming Night in 1923. The raucous pre-football rallies, though, remained quite separate from the somber official activities. In 1936, the College first began the tradition of Homecoming games.

And like all of Dartmouth’s big week-ends, Homecoming became in many ways an excuse to import women to the College. In the days before coeducation, when Hanover was far more of an outpost than it is today, Homecoming was one of the first times that women from area female colleges like Smith, Wellesley, would be trucked onto campus.

During World War II, the Homecoming celebrations were scaled down markedly.
In 1946, the formal College events and the unofficial rally were combined in a single grand Homecoming event, and for the first time the festivities were intentionally scheduled on the weekend of Homecoming. Since then, the Homecoming weekend has undergone a number of changes, but its unique essence remains.

Despite change, and the ensuing games of Homecoming weekend still provide the ideal opportunities for members of all the College communities to show their dedication, lest the old traditions fail.

See our special Homecoming Gifts.