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Who was the first Bevo and why is he called that?
By 1916, UT teams were called Longhorns for 16 years but never had a living mascot, except for the dog named Pig. Stephen Pinckney, a law school graduate, wanted to change that.
That year he worked for the US Attorney’s Office and had spent most of the year in West Texas helping raid raids on rustlers. In September, a raid near Laredo revealed an ox whose skin was so orange that Pinckney knew he had found his mascot.
With $ 1 contributions from 124 other alumni, Pinckney bought the animal and loaded it onto a freight car. The ox arrived at the Austin train station just in time for the football game against A&M. At halftime, two West Texas cowboys dragged the half-starved and frightened Longhorn into the field, where it was formally presented to the UT student body by a group of ex-Texas students.
The following month, while writing a report on the game, UT’s alumni magazine editor The Alcalde announced, “His name is Bevo. May he rule long! “
But the editor left no clues as to why his name was Bevo. Several theories have emerged over the century. Most likely, it came from the word “bee,” which was a common term for a meat-producing animal, to which an “o” was added, a popular way of creating nicknames at the time. (The story of Aggies, a soccer game, and branding has been debunked.)
Shortly afterwards, when rumors began to circulate that the Aggies were about to kidnap Bevo, the Longhorn was taken to a ranch 60 miles west of Austin. Within two months, the United States entered World War I and everything else was given a low priority.
The ox was almost forgotten by the end of the war in November 1919. Since food and care cost 50 cents a day and Bevo was not tame enough to be in the football stadium, let alone roam the campus, people fattened up and became the main course for the football banquet in 1920. It was a less sentimental time.
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