After 196 years, Amherst College finally has an official mascot — and it did not have to venture far to find a unique way to brand its athletes as the Mammoths. The mascot was announced earlier this month.
For years the college’s sports teams unofficially were called the “Lord Jeffs.” That name was dropped by the trustees in January 2016 after increasing objections about its association with Lord Jeffery Amherst, the commander of British forces in North America during the French and Indian War who historians say favored giving blankets contaminated with smallpox to Indians.
The 15-month process to decide on a mascot that was “unifying” with “positive qualities” and “broadly relevant and representative” produced 2,046 suggestions which were winnowed to 30 semifinalists from which the five finalists were chosen. A total of 9,295 alumni, students, faculty and staff then voted between March 20 and 31, selecting the Mammoths over Fighting Poets, Purple and White, Valley Hawks and Wolves.
During the submission process, mammoths were identified as “stupendous and monumental” and “near mythic” which would do well to represent Amherst athletes “as fierce competitors.” And it is particularly meaningful because the Beneski Museum of Natural History on campus houses a skeleton of a Columbian mammoth discovered by Amherst professor Frederick Brewster Loomis in 1925.
Congratulations to Amherst for finally getting rid of a controversial name and replacing it with a mascot that is unique in American college athletics.