Navy Week
From USAFA Folklore
Navy Week is the week prior to the annual football game between Air Force and Navy. The fourth class cadets will normally change their greeting to "Sink the Squids" or something similar. There may be a wing spirit dinner, and spirit missions and nukings are often conducted on the Navy exchange cadets, who in turn conduct their own spirit missions. Air Officers Commanding and faculty members who graduated from The Boat School are not necessarily immune, and neither are exchange cadets from the Coast Guard Academy (referred to as the "JV Navy" or "pseudo-squids"), who are close enough for the purposes of a nuking.
[edit] The first Air Force-Navy game: An account
The first Air Force-Navy football game was played on October 15, 1960, in Baltimore Memorial Stadium, which was the home of the old Baltimore Colts. The night before the game, the Classes of 1961 and 1962 were flown in a veritable convoy of Air Force planes from Peterson Field to the old Friendship Airport (today known as Baltimore-Washington International Airport). As Head Cheerleader, I was allowed to fly in the advance party in one the first aircraft and I recall seeing something reminiscent of the Berlin Airlift. There were planes landing and taking off continuously. Upon landing at O’dark thirty in the morning, we were bused to a group of World War II barracks at Fort Meade, about 20 miles south of Baltimore. When we were dropped in our barracks there were no lights, there was no heat and no bedding. A group of us had to figure out how to get everything going and for a kid from Puerto Rico, shoveling coal was a new experience. It was so cold that I slept in my uniform with my overcoat and between two mattresses. Of course, we had reveille the next morning, after what seemed two hours of sleep.
We were taken somewhere to eat a buffet breakfast and in typical cadet fashion we ate everything in sight. After breakfast the Cadet Wing was bused to the Stadium for the march-on. I had arrived a couple of hours earlier to set up for the normal pre-game greeting. The pre-game greeting consisted of the USAFA Pre-Game yell followed by the removal of caps. I was perched up in the Stadium Roof and gave the hand signals. I don’t think the Cadet Wing does this exercise any more. Believe me, it was a sight to watch and hear the Cadet Wing perform in unison as one man (no girls there yet). Although we only had about 1,000 cadets in 1960, the Cadet Wing would cheer in unison on signals from the Cheerleaders. All the cheerleaders had to be gymnasts and we would perform all kinds of tumbling exercises, including the famous trampolets, in which I tore up my knee the first time. After the march on and the pre-game yell, the Cadet Wing ran to their assigned seating and was met by a volley of smoke bombs that had been strategically placed in our stands by the Middies. Many of us grabbed the smoke bombs, ran across the field and threw them at the Brigade of Midshipmen. I guess the Middies were angry because a couple of days before a few of us succeeded in stealing the Navy Goat and brought it USAFA where we paraded it (the Navy goats are very smelly) in front of the Cadet Wing as a trophy.
The game was a dismal experience for Air Force. We got our asses whipped 35-3. Heisman Trophy Winner Joe Bellino led Navy and the Navy team went on to a 9-2 record including playing in the Orange Bowl against Missouri. Air Force ended the season with a 4-6 record.
However, I shall never forget the haughty attitude of the Navy team after the game when Joe Bellino refused to shake the outstretched hand of Air Force quarterback Richie Mayo. Bellino’s remarks were equally inappropriate when he yelled “why don’t you guys go back where you came from.” I do not recall the Navy team accepting the Air Force congratulations. I have many friends who are graduates of the Naval Academy. I realize that this may have been an isolated incident but the haunting memory of that incident has tainted my view of Air Force-Navy games and I relish when the Falcon eats Goat meat. - (Hector Negroni, Class of 1961)
