DKR Got One Right and One Wrong

I was a first-semester freshman at the University of Texas in the fall of 1971, doing my best to maintain some degree of equilibrium on that huge campus. My home, and that of 3,200 others, was Jester Center. While walking through an outdoor corridor on its east side, who did I see coming toward me but Darrell Royal. Coach of the Longhorns for the past 14 seasons (national champs in 1963, 1969 and 1970), he was a titanic figure. He was alone, and so was I. Closer and closer we got, our eyes locked. He was smiling, friendly. Before we passed and went our separate ways, he said, “Hello. How are you?” The great DKR was that kind to a lowly freshman. I knew then, it was an encounter I would never forget. In fact, I mentioned this to him many years later during an interview.  Of course, he had no recollection of it.

Royal did more than coach football; beginning in 1962, he took on the role of athletic director and held it until 1979—three years after he quit coaching at age 52. He made two aesthetic decisions that are still with us today. The first one, in my view, was a major success. The second—remember, these are subjective matters—was not. Let’s take them in order.

Darrell and Rooster

In early 1961, he met with Austin sporting-goods magnate Rooster Andrews. (Andrews, as you may know, had been the manager and a part-time, drop-kicking place kicker at UT from 1943 to 1945.) Royal wanted a logo to adorn the football helmet. Andrews contacted a graphic designer, whose name has been lost in the mists of time. What he/she and Andrews came up with pleased Royal greatly: the now very familiar Longhorn logo. It dispensed with the anatomical details used on previous versions going back as far as 1913. This design was simple, uncluttered, bold and strong—and yet understated. Even our rivals in College Station, Norman and elsewhere would admit that it was classy. The newly designed helmets made their debut out on the west coast on September 23, 1961, a 28-3 defeat of the California Golden Bears.

Whether Royal knew he was creating the Longhorn “brand,” it has become just that. Symbol of the University of Texas, it is known far and wide. I have seen more than one survey of the best-looking helmets in college football—again, obviously a subjective matter—and it always comes out at or near the top. I can see why. Am I a homer? I contend that if I were born in North Dakota or Georgia or Hawaii or Vermont, I would still feel the same.

Light, dark, light and then dark again

He should have left well enough alone because he screwed up the very next year. UT’s colors since 1885 have been orange and white, but the shade of orange has varied. It was rather bright up through the early 1920s. Since the jerseys were said to have faded over the course of a season and the big UT-A&M game was always the last on both teams’ schedules, the Aggies found a way to gig their Southwest Conference cousins by calling them “yellow bellies.” The term, I tell you, still has currency among some of the A&M faithful. So E.J. “Doc” Stewart, a strutting martinet of a coach, took it upon himself to institute a darker shade, calling it “burnt orange.” This really did not last long as the Horns’ jerseys were again lighter and brighter by the mid-1930s. So it remained during the tenures of Clyde Littlefield, Jack Chevigny, Dana X. Bible, Blair Cherry and Ed Price, and during Royal’s first five seasons.

I am dating myself here, but I remember the ’61 team’s home unis. That bright jersey, worn by Jimmy Saxton, Mike Cotten, Tommy “T-Bird” Ford, David McWilliams (destined to coach the team from 1987 to 1991), Johnny Treadwell, Scott Appleton et al. was sublime. But the coach somehow found fault. He had a conversation with Littlefield (UT’s track coach from 1920 to 1961) who told him the color used to be darker. That’s all he needed to hear. He unilaterally made a change, and so when Texas hosted Oregon at Memorial Stadium on September 22, 1962 (25-13, Horns) the fans got to see for themselves. Five years later, the Board of Regents gave it their imprimatur, holding that “Pantone 159” is the school’s one and only shade of orange.

I have never liked it and I never will. It’s an ugly color, almost brown. Maybe you think I exaggerate. I was watching a UT basketball game on television about 20 years ago when I heard the announcer mention that the Horns were wearing “brown.” Admittedly, the guy was an idiot and should have known better, but he said it. Other schools that feature orange prominently include Miami, Oregon State, Syracuse, Clemson, Florida, Illinois, Virginia Tech, Sam Houston State and Tennessee. Ah, the Vols! Now, that is a bright and beautiful orange. Not a single person in Knoxville would try to change it in any way. I envy them and think of what we had. It has caused me a lot of emotional pain over the years.

A 1960s protest

I am far from alone in holding this view. Many people complained when the new color was unveiled. In 1966, a group of students and alumni presented a petition to the Board of Regents urging them to ditch the “dark, muddy and murky burnt orange” Royal had foisted on them and return to the old (better) color. “The winds of whim and aesthetic taste must not be permitted to overturn the university’s tradition,” they declared. They pointed out that in 1950 the Regents had adopted a university seal featuring a color that resembled a certain citrus fruit.

Color, I have read, is vibration and energy. The hypothalamus of the human brain processes sensory inputs such as color and translates them into emotions. We have innate reactions to colors; this has been pseudo-scientifically proven. There are exuberant colors, muted colors, hot and cold colors. Combine that with a university’s athletic teams, and passion is sure to be aroused.

The aforementioned interview with DKR covered a lot of ground, this included. We talked about both the Longhorn logo—two thumbs up!—and the changed color in 1962. He asked me which I liked better. I told him in the nicest way possible that what we had before was superior. The issue was brought back to me recently when I attended a UT alumni gathering here in Seoul. After the socializing, dinner and speeches, the hosting Korean Alumni Association presented Texas jackets to Greg Fenves (university president), Jay Hartzell (dean of the business school), Clay Johnston (dean of the medical school) and numerous others. What a splendid piece of clothing this was, in bright orange and white! None of that ugly brown stuff, no Pantone 159. This, friends, was a huge difference—and all for the better. I have a feeling, though, that UT’s Office of Brand, Trademarks and Licensing was irked. A cease-and-desist letter may have already been sent out.

I realize that some people just love what Royal did back in 1962 and have no wish to change it. But as an alumnus and a person who was on or around the campus for more than three decades and has studied Texas sports history in depth, I figure my opinion deserves to be heard. The Longhorn logo is excellent—on that we can all agree. Burnt orange, however, reeks.