College Mascot’s Name Is a Legacy From a Very Big Performer

Funny how items in this column connect. After I wrote about the famously nicknamed UC Irvine Anteaters, a professor there -- obviously willing for her school to share the glory -- e-mailed me about another unusual mascot.

“While were taking our daughter on college tours this summer,” said Mary Gilly, “we learned that the mascot of Tufts University [in Medford, Mass.] is the Jumbos.

“Apparently, P.T. Barnum donated a bunch of money on the condition that the school’s mascot be named after his beloved elephant. I thought this would be a good mascot if the school had a sumo wrestling team!”

Jumbos [cont.]: The circus impresario, I discovered, even gave the school Jumbo, who had earlier been stuffed.

The Tufts website notes that Jumbo’s status was threatened in 1949 by the University of Bridgeport, which demanded the creature on grounds that the Connecticut college town had been home to the circus.

Bridgeport said Barnum owned only half of the circus and thus only half of Jumbo.

Tufts replied that since it had been a good steward of Jumbo, Tufts “had the right to choose which half of the elephant it wanted and naturally decided upon the front. Bridgeport declined to take Jumbo’s rump ... “ Alas, Jumbo was destroyed in a fire in 1975.

Fight on, Poets: A poll taken by the National Directory of College Athletics to find the most unique college nickname rated the Anteaters No. 4 and the Jumbos No. 18, behind the No. 1 Banana Slugs of UC Santa Cruz. The Whittier College Poets came in at No. 14.

Such a deal: John Williams of Hermosa Beach chanced upon a freebie from an auto garage better not taken (see photo).

Unreal estate: “Ms. Piggy is interested in this property,” wrote Mel Pollner (see accompanying).

Flighty furnishings: Lynn Park of La Canada Flintridge noticed that someone apparently was trying to use sex appeal to sell a piano while Doris Walden of Palm Desert read about a chair that would appeal only to masochists (see accompanying).

miscelLAny: Today’s “Duh!” award goes to Bank of America’s automatic teller machines, which instruct users who have punched in their request, “Please wait while your transaction is being processed.” No, I usually decline to wait. I take off and let someone else pick up my money and credit card.

Steve Harvey can be reached at (800) LATIMES, Ext. 77083, by fax at (213) 237-4712, by mail at Metro, L.A. Times, 202 W. 1st St., L.A. 90012, and by e-mail at steve.harvey@latimes.com.