Tag Archives: Ledyard Bridge Challenge

The Ledyard Bridge Challenge (Annabel Revers)

Title: The Ledyard Bridge Challenge

General Information:

  • Type: Verbal Folklore
  • Language: English
  • Country of Origin: United States
  • Informant: KC ’18
  • Date Collected: 11/5/2021
  • Location Collected: Phone Call

Informant Data:

  • KC ’18 is a twenty-five-year-old female and a Dartmouth alumni. She is a member of the Class of 2018 and studied Economics and Environmental studies during her time at Dartmouth. She is from Vancouver, Canada, but is now living in New York City where she works as a consultant. During her time at Dartmouth, she was a member of a sorority and enjoyed spending time with her friends when she was not busy with work.

Contextual Data

  • Cultural Context: Dartmouth has various traditions that can be classified as “challenges.” While their origins are often unknown, these challenges provide students with both entertainment during their time at Dartmouth and the opportunity to participate in and perpetuate Dartmouth traditions. They also provide Dartmouth students with the opportunity to prove that they can do something challenging outside of academics and sports. Furthermore, they create a bond among the friends that attempt them together. These traditions are passed down among generations of students, and the “Ledyard Bridge Challenge” is just one of many such challenges.
  • Social Context: The Ledyard Challenge is typically attempted in warmer months when the water temperature is bearable to swim in. Many students aim to complete this challenge at least once during their time at Dartmouth. Sophomore Summer, or the summer during which the entire sophomore class takes summer courses, is a fairly typical time to complete the challenge because of the warm weather. The Ledyard Challenge is one of the riskier challenges in Dartmouth culture because of the possibility of being caught by campus security or Hanover police. Because of this, it is also a challenge that is quite effective in bonding students through common experience.

Item:

  • The “Ledyard Bridge Challenge,” also called “Ledyard,” refers to the challenge of a person, or more commonly a group, removing their clothing and swimming across the Connecticut River. The participants then run back across the Ledyard Bridge and dress themselves before they get caught by campus security or the police. For example, a student will ask their friend, “Want to do Ledyard later tonight?”.

Associated File:

  • Transcript: “I first heard about Ledyard my freshman year. Pretty much everyone on campus at least knows what it is by then. The thought of it terrified me at first, but I finally had the guts to try it my sophomore summer. Luckily my friends and I successfully completed the challenge without getting caught. I was so relieved! I think most people try the challenge at least once during their time at Dartmouth. As far as I can tell, it’s a tradition that’s been passed down for decades now, usually just through upperclassmen talking about it to younger students. I think most people wanna try it just for a thrill and to spice up their time here. Life gets a little monotonous on campus sometimes and you have to find ways to keep yourself entertained. It also makes you feel like you’re really a part of Dartmouth once you complete the challenge, like you really belong.”

Informant’s Comments:

  • Even though I found the Ledyard Challenge very stressful, I would still recommend students try it with their friends just because of what a bonding experience it is.

Collector’s Comments:

  • The Ledyard Challenge is something I only heard about later in my freshman year at Dartmouth. Unlike slang that refers to locations on campus, slang surrounding challenges seems to be learned a little bit later on in students’ time at Dartmouth, perhaps because it is less immediately necessary for integrating into Dartmouth culture and is typically not attempted until students are further into their time at Dartmouth. It should also be noted that the challenge itself can be considered Customary Folklore–it is the phrase itself as slang and its meaning that we are documenting here.

Collector’s Name: Annabel Revers

Tags/Keywords: Verbal Folklore, Students, English, Dartmouth, Slang, Challenges, Ledyard, Ledyard Bridge Challenge

The Ledyard Bridge Challenge

Ledyard Bridge Challenge

LB

When participating in the Ledyard Bridge Challenge, a person or, more commonly, a group must go down to the bank of the Connecticut River, remove their clothing, and swim across to the Vermont side of the river bank. Once this is done, the participant or group of participants must run back across Ledyard Bridge, which connects the New Hampshire and Vermont banks of the Connecticut River, and dress themselves without being caught by the Hanover Police.

Folklore Type: Customary


Ledyard Bridge Challenge Stories 

May 30, 2016

Anonymous Male 17’
Age: 21
Birthplace: New York, NY
Current Residence: Hanover, NH
Where collected: Dartmouth College
Date Collected: April 20, 2016
Genre: Verbal-Story
Language: English
Country of Origin: USA
Social / Cultural Context: Entertainment

Informant’s Comments:

“It was my Sophomore Summer, and there was only about a week left, so a couple of my friends decided to meet up with a couple of girls and go do the Ledyard Bridge Challenge. My friends and the group of girls we were with had been at the House drinking and pre-gaming getting ready for Ledyard Bridge. After everyone was at the point of feeling loose, we all headed down to the Connecticut River. As we started to strip, the Hanover Police came. We all made a dash for the river and jumped in. My close friend and I made it across to the Vermont River bank. My other friend managed to escape from the cops with the girls. My friend and I ran across the Ledyard Bridge, grabbed our clothes, and went to the House to hide. We thought we were in the clear until the Hanover Police came knocking on our door. We had to turn ourselves into the Hanover Police because our fourth friend was missing; we mistakenly thought he got away. We went with the police to the site where we jumped in. We couldn’t find him, and the police couldn’t find him either. Fire trucks and dive teams were called in as they started searching for him in the Connecticut River. As morning approached, and the search was wrapping up we found our friend passed out in the bushes next to many cop cars. Over $10,000 was spent looking for my friend, and the whole time he was passed out in the bushes.”


Anonymous Male 15′ (Alumni)
Age: 21
Birthplace: Rye, NY
Current Residence: Hanover, NH
Where Collected: Dartmouth College
Date Collected: April 20, 2016
Genre: Verbal-Story
Language: English
Country of Origin: USA
Social / Cultural Context: Entertainment

Informant’s Comments:

“I was doing the Ledyard Challenge my freshman year. As I was running back across the bridge, HPO started chasing me. Luckily, I didn’t have my wallet with my clothes. So, I booked it all the way back to my dorm at the Choates. As soon as I got back I locked my room and turned the lights out. I was never caught.”


Anonymous Female 18′
Age: 20
Birthplace: Fort Lauderdale, FL
Current Residence: Hanover, NH
Where Collected: Dartmouth College
Date Collected: April 27, 2016
Genre: Verbal-Story
Language: English
Country of Origin: USA
Social / Cultural Context: Entertainment
Informant’s Comments:

“I heard about the challenge before I attended Dartmouth, on my recruiting visit.  All of the stories I heard made me afraid of the challenge because almost everybody got caught.  I finally built up enough confidence after two years on campus, and set off for the challenge on a warm spring night.  I mentally prepared myself, in case I got caught, but I luckily ended up completing the challenge with no sign of SNS or HPO.  I consider myself very lucky.”


Anonymous Female 19′
Age: 18
Birthplace: Hoboken, NJ
Current Residence: Hanover, NH
Where Collected: Dartmouth College
Date Collected: April 23, 2016
Genre: Verbal Story
Language: English
Country of Origin: USA
Social / Cultural Context: Entertainment

Informant’s Comments:

“I came to campus in September excited to participate in all that Dartmouth offered.  I heard of the Ledyard Bridge Challenge from an upperclassman in the first month of school.  On the same day that I was told about it, I decided to complete it.  Unfortunately, I always had poor circulation in my body, and that week happen to be very chilly.  The water was very cold when I got in and as I swam, my body tensed up.  HPO was at the scene waiting for me to return to the New Hampshire side.  At one point during my swim, I started screaming because my body got so cold, to the point where I could no longer swim.  One of the HPO officers, saw the severity of the situation and dove in to help me.  He passed me a life jacket (some HPO officers keep them for these situations) and helped me to land.  I was very embarrassed, thanked the officer and apologized.  The officer let me off with a warning and took me to Dick’s House for the night.”


Anonymous Male 16′
Age: 22
Birthplace: Westport, CT
Current Residence: Hanover, NH
Where Collected: Dartmouth College
Date Collected: April 27, 2016
Genre: Verbal-StoryLanguage: English
Country of Origin: USA
Social / Cultural Context: Entertainment
Informant’s Comments:

“I did the Ledyard Challenge with my girlfriend at the time.  It was in the spring of my Junior year.  We made it across the river, and as we were running back, HPO showed up.  One officer got out of the car and started chasing us.  We reached our clothes, grabbed them, and continued running.  The officer caught my girlfriend, but I continued running and did not get caught.  My girl was already upset at me due to a past instance and this put her over the edge.  She broke up with me the next morning.”


Anonymous Female 17′
Age: 20
Birthplace: Dallas, TX
Current Residence: Dartmouth
Date Collected: May 4, 2016
Genre: Verbal-Story
Language: English
Country of Origin: USA
Social / Cultural Context: Entertainment

Informant’s Comments:

“My sorority sisters and I decided to do the Ledyard Bridge. We stripped and jumped in. We made it to the other side without being caught. We ran across the bridge unnoticed again. When we got to the area where our clothes were supposed to be, we couldn’t find them. We spent half an hour looking for them. We then had to call for another one of our sister’s to pick us up. It turns out that our clothes were taking by one of my friend’s boyfriend and his friends. It was not at all funny because we could have been caught.”


Collector’s Comments

The members who attempted and completed the Dartmouth Seven mentioned above, each did it with the purpose to claim they completed the Ledyard Bridge Challenge. Collectively, the Ledyard Bridge Challenge is the most terrifying challenge on campus. Dartmouth Students’ motivation and purpose, as well as for each individual’s reason, to complete the Ledyard Bridge Challenge are so they could carry on Dartmouth tradition and culture that has been around for decades at Dartmouth. By completing the Ledyard Bridge Challenge, each person feels a closer sense of community that is immersed throughout this campus. The Ledyard Bridge Challenge allows a unique perspective for Dartmouth students to create bonds with other Dartmouth students that ties them into the folk group of Dartmouth Seven students, whether that be they successfully completed Ledyard Bridge, or if Hanover Police ended their attempts.

Dartmouth Folklore & Collection Process

Proof of Dartmouth Folklore

The Dartmouth Seven, the Ledyard Bridge Challenge, and the Lou’s Challenge are all well-known challenges among the Dartmouth “folk” (i.e. students, professors). These three challenges are the most well-known among Dartmouth Students. The origin of each is unknown, but there are rumors about where each one comes from. Most Dartmouth students hear about these challenges from either an upperclassman or a fellow classmate. Because these challenges are passed on from incoming freshman class to incoming freshman class, it is proof of its folklore; the Dartmouth Seven, the Ledyard Bridge Challenge, and Lou’s Challenge survive because they are passed down annually to new Dartmouth students.

How We Collected Our Folklore

The stories were collected from a range of Dartmouth students and Dartmouth Alumni, both male and female. Through one-on-one interviews, we were able to collect Dartmouth Challenge stories. In addition, surveys were conducted in order to get the broadest range of contributions possible.

All of the stories we collected were from people who wished to remain anonymous. In order to respect their wishes for privacy, we removed their names from our database and changed the names of people within the various folklore examples.

We decided to choose the most PG-13 related Dartmouth Challenges stories due to the graphic content some stories contain. Because we wished the stories to stay a true as possible from our informants, if a story was too graphic we left it out. We choose the best six stories for each Dartmouth Challenge to include in our collection project.

Finally, participants were asked why they partake in these challenges and what the challenges mean to them. Due to the similarity of many of the responses, we combined them all into one collective response at the bottom of each challenge page under our collector’s comment section.