Family Weekend’s meaning has changed
■The weekend used to be
a campus-wide festival with
colorful events, but now
it showcases the University
By Beata Mostafavi
Oregon Daily Emerald
Graduate Holly Hutchins remem
bers spending hours making an Ara
bian float — out of napkins and
chicken wire.
The float featured Arabian Nights
princess Shahrazad and was made
to flow down the brightly lit banks
of the Mill Race, along with other
elaborate floats for the University’s
1960 Canoe Fete.
He still has a vision of classic jazz
artist Hoagy Carmichael, who had
performed at the University that
weekend, dressed in shorts and sit
ting next to students and their fami
lies. Everyone was waiting to see the
floats, which greek houses had spent
weeks to make, trail down the river.
But as if on cue, it began to pour
down rain—soaking onlookers and
the napkin floats, which turned into
big “soggy messes.”
“We were all devastated,”
Hutchins said. “If it didn’t rain
though, it was a spectacular event.”
These are the types of memories
many alumni still have from what
used to be called “Parents’ Week
end” at the University. A few years
ago, the University named the event
“Family Weekend” to be more in
clusive and expanded the event to
two separate weekends during the
school year. The spring weekend
now centers around an award cere
mony that spotlights honored stu
dents at the University while the fall
weekend focuses on football games.
In the University’s first years, Par
ents’ Weekend began as a competi
tion between the junior and sopho
more students, who participated in
a game of “Capture the Flag” at Vil
lard Hall. Eventually the contest
toned down into a tug-of-war game
on the Mill Race.
In the 1920s, two separate week
ends were also held for mothers and
fathers but were later combined
with Parents’ Weekend.
. But the weekend was most popu
lar in the 1950s and ’60s, when the
Canoe Fete was known as one of the
most extravagant University events.
A stage and grandstand that seated
10,000 people stretched across the
banks while an orchestra played
music to accompany the theme-dec
orated floats. The first float always
carried the selected queen and her
court—another feature of the week
end — which were taken to the
stage to host the evening.
The “All Campus Sing” was an
other one of the weekend’s prime
events, featuring famous stars such
as Nat “King” Cole, Bill Cosby,
Dionne Warwick and Carmichael,
who performed at concerts in
McArthur Court. Hundreds of stu
dents who had practiced songs for
months would then join in and sing
with the entertainers.
But the traditions slowly began
fading in the ’70s, and soon there
were not enough people left to keep
the festivities alive.
Hutchins, Class of ’60 and a Theta
Chi alumnus, acknowledges that
times have definitely changed.
“It was quite a show,” he said. “It
[was] one of those special times,
[now] superseded by other events.”
Jim Perry, Class of ’58 and a Sig
ma Phi Epsilon alumnus, remem
bers the Canoe Fete and All Campus
Sing as events that not only united
families with students, but
brought the whole Univer
sity community together.
“It was a big deal,” he said.
“It was an opportunity for all
students to focus on one
thing ... It was just a different
time.”
Now returning to campus as
a father during the weekend,
Perry does not see the same
kind of unifying events. But he
added that in earlier decades,
the school’s population was also
half the size it is now, which
made it easier to bring people to
gether. There is also a broad range
of diverse groups and interests, he
said, that make up today’s student
population of 17,000.
Mary Hudzikiewicz, retired as
sistant dean of student life who is
helping with commencement this
year, said today the campus unites
for causes students did not know or
even care about before. She men
tioned events, such as Take Back the
Night, that bring the community to
gether.
But Hudzikiewicz, who also at
tended the University between
1959 and 1963, said the traditional
events will not be forgotten.
“When people I went to school
with get together, we still talk about
those times,” she said.
She added that even without
those events, Family Weekend still
has value—but in a different way.
“Nothing can ever stay the same,”
she said. “Times have changed and
people have changed. Now we’re tak
ing the opportunity to highlight out
standing students and showcase the
University... [Family Weekend] just
has a different kind of meaning.”
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