Homecoming Bonfire

General Information:
Informant: SH
Place: Hanover, NH
Date: October 9, 2021
Genre/Form of folklore: Customary/Ritual
Title: “Bonfire”

Informant Data: SH is an 18-year-old Dartmouth student who is a part of the class of 2025. He is from Washington State, but he lives on campus at Dartmouth in Hanover, NH for most of the year. He is a student-athlete participating on the football team and has an interest in studying economics.

Contextual Data: Every term at Dartmouth has one big weekend of celebration, and in the fall this is “Homecoming” weekend for the incoming freshman and alumni. There are parades, speeches, and a large bonfire that the freshman class walks around. While the freshmen walk around the fire, the upperclassmen yell at them and tell them to “touch the fire”. This is one of the most well-known traditions at Dartmouth that all students and alumni look forward to.

Social Data: The bonfire is a massive fire set on the green and designed to be run (or walked) around by the freshman class. Since it is during homecoming weekend, most of the campus plus many alumni surround the fire while the freshmen go around. The fire has the numbers of the graduating year of the freshmen class (24 and 25 this year because of COVID).

Item: The massive fire annually set on Dartmouth’s campus on The Green. 

Transcript
Collector: “What is your attitude towards Homecoming Weekend and the Bonfire tradition?”

Informant: “Homecoming was pretty cool. The fire was massive and I enjoyed feeling the heat from across the green. I did not expect it to be as large as it was. I appreciated that our class was able to make a lot of fun memories together.”

Collector Comment:
Homecoming weekend in general is a great tradition at Dartmouth. It is super cool to see all of the alumni come back and celebrate at the football game, bonfire, around campus, in their former frats/sororities, etc. Dartmouth alumni seem especially drawn to the campus after they graduate, and it is clear that homecoming weekend is a wonderful example of this.


Collected by:

Ross Parrish 20

Cincinnati, OH

Hanover, NH

Dartmouth College

RUSS 013

Fall 2021

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