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MONDAY, FEBRUARY 27, 2012
FINAL BORDER SHOWDOWN
THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
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Jayhawks have the last laugh with the fans
Dressed as Civil War figure Jo Tigers fan passes by during S
Jayhawk fans hold up many diffk tip off.
JAYHAWKS FOREVER Missouri town protests mascot
Leaders of a small city in Missouri claim their resolution criticizing the naming of University of Kansas' Jayhawk was taken too seriously.
The Osceola Board of Aldermen passed the resolution in September of 2011 for the 150th anniversary of the devastating attack by the Kansas-native raiding Jayhawkers on the city.
In the resolution, the city officially acknowledged that the attack in 1861 occurred and led to William Quantrill's raid on Lawrence in 1863, in which "Missourians had no choice but to defend themselves from the murderous attacks perpetrated by the Jayhawkers."
As a result, it officially condemned Kansas' use of the Jayhawk as a mascot and requested that no citizen of Osecola or alumni of the University of Missouri capitalize the "K" in any form of "Kansas," stating it isn't a proper name or place.
The resolution prompted a response by KU News Director Jill Jess.
"A Jayhawk is a blue bird with a red head and a big yellow beak that wears
boots," Jess stated in an email response to the Columbia Tribute. "It would be hard to confuse it with terrorist intent, though we admit we have been terrorizing the Tigers on the basketball court for some time. Tigers have been known to kill people. Bears, too."
As local and national media wrote about the resolution, Osceola Mayor Larry Hutsler said it was originally meant to be taken lightheartedly.
Chancellor Bernadette Gray-Little also commented on the resolution during a fireside chat. "We considered their suggestions yesterday from 5 p.m. to 5:01 p.m. It has been taken into consideration. We are not planning on eliminating the Jayhawk name from our mascot."
"It was a fun poke at Lawrence and the University from the University of Missouri," Hutsler says. "It was brought up at the anniversary of the burning and was supposed to be a funny satire joke to promote a fun, competitive rivalry, but it didn't turn out that way."
sities, known as the "Border War," or "Border Showdown," is the second oldest in NCAA's football bowl subdivision, and goes back to the Civil War, when independent Kansan and Missourian forces burned and looted towns in both states.
This attack was a prime motivator for William Quantrill's infamous raid on Lawrence, which resulted in the deaths of more than 180 men and the destruction of several Lawrence businesses.
The rivalry between the two univer-
In 1861, a group of Kansan raiders known as the "Jayhawkers," led by U.S. Senator and Gen. James Lane, sacked Osceola and plundered much of its wealth. Nine Osceolan men were given a swift trial and executed. At the time, Osceola was one of the largest cities in Missouri with a population of about 3,000. The attack left the city in ruins and the town never fully recovered. According to the 2010 Census, it currently has a population of 947.
The raid caused heated backlash and a deep animosity between the two states, which is represented today by
the sports rivalry between the Jayhawks and the Tigers.
Words by Vikaas Shanker
Although 150 years separates the two events, some Missourians are still concerned that history is not being represented fairly.
Mitchell Moore, a Missouri graduate and lawyer in Columbia, Mo., came up with the idea of the Osceola resolution to educate the public on Osceola's sacking.
"Every time we have these [Border War games] on TV, commentators talk about the raid on Lawrence but leave out Osceola," he says. "It bothered me that they would adopt the Kansas narrative. So, I was coming up with a way, with the anniversary approaching, to commemorate the folks in Osceola."
Moore took the idea to colleagues and had a contest to come up with the best resolution. "A lot of it was tongue-in-cheek with the purpose to educate people on what happened to Lawrence and Osceola," he says. "The narrative about the roots of the Border War is clarified and more accurate."
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