“See You Later, Alligator”
by Glenn Miller, Class of 1957

Glenn Miller, Class of 1957, remembers some good times while he was at Marshall in the 1950s. One thing that stands out is the Second Annual Cannibal Hop, held Feb. 18, 1956, by the Delta Iota chapter of Pi Kappa Alpha. The ball was held at the Cabaret Room, a popular dance hall on the outskirts of Huntington.

And why was this so memorable? Imagine 100 live baby alligators let loose in a room full of women!

It all began when one of the PKA brothers received a live alligator as a gift from his fiancée. “Possosck I” lived at he fraternity house for almost a year before he was bequeathed to the zoology department. Black cloth was worn behind the fraternity pins to remember that day.

Some of the brothers got the idea to order a large number of the ’gators as favors for the upcoming Cannibal Hop. A local pet shop filled the order and “one hundred and twenty strong – twelve to twenty inches long,” they arrived. Then the fun began.

The Pikes took the alligators one by one from the large container and packed them, carefully leashed, into corsage boxes, with the name of a local florist on the boxes. A short time later at the dance, the ladies were lined up in a large circle in the middle of the room with the brothers on the inside of the circle. They handed out the corsage boxes on a given signal and took a few steps back.

Two hours later, as the screams diminished, the girls took their party favors home. There were as many as 11 of the very hearty alligators in the sorority houses and dorms. Eventually they were given to area schools or shipped home. Possosck II lived out his life in the chapter house fish pond. (A few ended up in the Ohio River, according to a later Herald-Dispatch article.) It created quite a lot of publicity for our chapter!”

“In today’s politically correct world, this of course would not be acceptable,” said Glenn. “it was one of those good times we experienced in the era of Marshall College.”

Glenn and his wife, Becky, live in Longwood, California.

Excerpts from an article by Dale Freeland, date and source unknown.