Browse Exhibits (23 total)
WestConn's farewell to the "Colonials"
As the Mascot Advisory Committee deliberates on the new direction for WCSU's mascot, this site attempts to give a look back at how the University has presented itself in nicknames and with mascots in the past.
The Mascot Advisory Committee is not simply charged with replacing Chuck - the mascot, but also to move away from Colonials in order to find an image that better represents this 117-year-old institution.
There is also a chapter in this exhibit on some of the themes that define WestConn's home town and region.
First - some definitions.
Nickname:
OED- A (usually familiar or humorous) name which is given to a person, place, etc., as a supposedly appropriate replacement for or addition to the proper name.
A college or a team's nickname is usually a contrivance to identify a school or that school's teams. For example, Buckeyes is the official nickname used by Ohio State. WestConn is an unofficial nickname for WCSU. Colonials was the official nickname of WCSU's athletic…
WestConn's First African-American Students
It would not be until the late 1960s that the composition of college and university student body populations began to numerically reflect the African-American populations around them in the U.S. In a 1969 photograph in the WCSU Archives, members of the then newly-formed Afro-American Club can be seen giving the Black Power fist salute for their yearbook photo, signaling an overt change in the culture at WestConn; however, earlier in the century, the educational possibilities were quite different for those Afro-American Club members’ parents and grandparents. The population of African-Americans was small in Danbury in the early 1900s; in 1895, there were only 14 registered births in the City of Danbury of persons listed as "black" under race. Furthermore, based on photographic evidence, a very small number of that small community entered Danbury High School in the early decades of the 20th century.
Yet, standing in the back row of the 1906 senior class picture for the Danbury Normal…
World War II in Life Magazine Advertisements
The entry of the United States into WWII demanded the mobilization of virtually all of American society and civilian support for the war effort was crucial to achieving victory. This exhibit demonstrates the role of corporate advertising toward that end using advertisements which appeared in LIFE Magazine *, perhaps the most popular magazine of the time.
The exhibit also highlights some of the artists whose work formed a crucial part of the advertisements’ messages.
* LIFE Magazine (ISSN 0024-3019) was published bY Time Inc. The following are scans from the physical copies owned by Western Connecticut State University (WCSU) and are displayed here in compliance with fair use restrictions. WCSU claims no rights to the materials; reproduction of these items and other uses must be obtained from the rights holder and not WCSU.