On February 6, 1814, Edouard-Frédéric Sorin was born and baptized in the small town of Ahuillé, France. He was born the seventh of nine children into a relatively well-to-do Catholic farming family, a generation or so after the bloody French Revolution. The Revolutionaries heavily persecuted the Catholic Church, sending thousands...
In the early 1880s, University Vice President Rev. John Zahm and his brother Albert took excursions to the West, Southwest, and Mexico in scientific pursuits, of archeology, geology, and anthropology. In addition to making observations, they were actively acquiring specimens to replace those destroyed in the 1879 fire. Along the way,...
Since the beginning of collegiate football when Princeton played Rutgers in 1869, the game has been constantly evolving. One aspect of the game that was in flux for many years was passing. While lateral and backward passes or pitches were legal, anything that crossed the line of scrimmage was against...
The Archives of the University of Notre Dame recently received a donation of interesting memorabilia from the Notre Dame vs. Southern California (USC) football game on 11/28/1953. An eight year old Felix Quesada Jr. attended the game at the Coliseum with his father. After the 49-14 Notre Dame victory, Felix...
In 1888, Rev. Edward Sorin, CSC, celebrated his Golden Jubilee – fifty years since his ordination as a priest on May 27, 1838, in LeMans, France. Shortly after his ordination, Sorin joined Rev. Basil Moreau’s fledgling Congregation of the Holy Cross, which sent Sorin as a missionary to America in...
Only four Notre Dame student athletes have earned monograms in four different sports – Alfred Bergman (Class of 1914), Rupert Mills (1915), Johnny Lujack (1948), and George Ratterman (1949). Mills earned monograms in baseball, basketball, track, and football. Along with his athletic ability, Mills was president of the Senior Law...
Notre Dame’s military ties pre-date the Civil War, so when war broke out between the North and the South, Notre Dame inevitably became involved in the conflict. Students and alumni joined the ranks, on both sides of the fighting. Members of the Congregation of Holy Cross also volunteered, but in...
On the Feast of Corpus Christi, May 31, 1866, the University of Notre Dame was officially consecrated and the statue of the Virgin Mary atop the dome was dedicated. The newspapers at the time claimed that “the ceremony will eclipse everything of the kind which has ever taken place in...
Alumni Association president John Neeson inaugurated Universal Notre Dame (UND) Night as a means for alumni to connect with their alma mater without having to travel to campus for Alumni Reunion. The first UND Night was held on April 24, 1924, and more than forty Alumni Clubs gathered in their...
Bookstore B-Ball Tournament Finals The Basketball Bible (The King James Brogan Version) lists 3 virtues: faith, hope, and the greatest of these, the charity stripe. If you like Hoosier Hysteria, you’ll love An Tostal’s Bookstore B-Ball tourney. It’s a single elimination tourney with the finals being played on Frivolous Friday. ...