We Want Panties!
The Great Raid of '61...
by Jim Nicar

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The University of Texas at Austin

College life in the 1950s was far from bland. The Korean Conflict, McCarthyism and Elvis Presley had students' attention, along with stuffing people into telephone booths, disassembling cars and reassembling them in the offices of college deans, and of all things, panty raids.

Not surprisingly, university administrators took a dim view on this campus activity. A 1956 raid at the University of California in Berkeley caused several thousand dollars in damaged doors and windows, as hundreds of men forced their way into a row of sorority homes and snatched undergarments from dresser drawers.

One angry housemother defended her charges with the blunt end of an umbrella handle, and quoted shouting at one offender, "You! I know your mother!" At Rutgers University in New Jersey, panty raids were pronounced "childish" by the college deans and quickly outlawed. In response, the Rutgers student newspaper printed a list of co-eds living in the dorms under the title "Here They Are, Men, Go To It!"

Panty raids made their debut in Austin in May, 1952, and continued sporadically for about five years. The women's dormitories were favorite targets, though sorority houses and off campus dorms received their share of visits. Officially, the University administration banned the activity, threatened participants with disciplinary probation or worse, and at times even collected Blanket Tax cards on the spot. The cards, which proved a student had paid their campus fees, was required to gain entrance to UT sporting events, especially football games. The cards were returned after a visit to the Dean's office, but it was often not before the hapless student had been forced to miss a game.

It was a warm Thursday evening on November 2, 1961, when a fire started in a trash bin near the men's dorms on the southeast side of the campus. As Austin fire trucks arrived to extinguish the flames, the commotion brought out the residents of Brackenridge, Roberts, Prather and Moore-Hill Halls. Once outside and away from the books, the group resolved not to return right away, but to pay a friendly visit to the women's dorms. Setting off around the back end of Gregory Gym, the crowd swelled with residents of the temporary San Jacinto dorms. By the time the group arrived in front of Kinsolving Dormitory, some 2,500 men were chanting, "We want girls! We want panties!"

The crowd changed tactics, and instead of the direct approach, began to serenade the ladies with The Eyes of Texas. This didn't work either, and not wanting to waste the evening, the group moved across the street to try their luck at Blanton Dormitory.

Blanton residents were more cooperative. A single pair of undergarments appeared, quickly followed by "an airdrop of flimsies which rallied the troops." The men below chanted "More! More! More!" and some would-be Romeos tried to scale the walls of the dorm.

By now, the entire University Police force, along with twelve additional officers of the Austin Police had arrived to break-up the proceedings. While they could apprehend a few at a time, the best they could do was to keep the crowd moving. The police charged. The longhorns stampeded. North to the Scottish Rite Dorm, where girls were instructed to lower their window shades, and sprinklers were turned on to flood the lawn.

West to the sorority houses and some limited success, and then back to the campus. At Andrews dorm, some of the girls went up to the sun deck to "greet their worshippers."

Before long, even the statue of Diana the Huntress, in the center of the women's quad, was sporting the latest in women's lingerie.

Arno Nowotny, the Dean of Student Life, arrived on the scene, collected Blanket Tax cards by the handful, and set up appointments for their owners to retrieve them the following morning. It wasn't until well after midnight that the last cry of "We want panties!" was heard.

The event caused quite a stir on the campus. Some of the residents of the Kirby Hall Dorm (now the Kirby Hall School) complained in a letter to the Daily Texan that they had been left out of the festivities.

Another raid, though not quite as large, occurred the following year. On Thursday, October 11th, following the OU football rally, a group of 1,000 men descended on the women's dorms. Dean Nowotny and the University Police were ready, but so were the students. Not wanting to miss the OU football game, most had conveniently left their Blanket Tax cards at home. The roving crowd made certain Kirby Hall was on the route, and in turn, "panties streamed into the air like pollen from a flower in full bloom."