Cool Alum: OSKI
by Rachel Shaffer
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OSKI
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Oski. He cavorts along Memorial Stadium sidelines. He hugs kids on Cal Day. He drinks through a straw in his eyehole, a gross but mesmerizing trick. This fall, Berkeley's lovable bear mascot turns 65, with no signs of stopping. Which means, for over six decades, a parade of undergraduates have sweated it out under a stuffy bear head, wool sweater and size-15 tennis shoes. Moreover, they're under a super-duper, heavy-duty, triple-strength oath to keep it a secret from everyone forever and ever. It's enough to make you wonder, as your attention drifts between plays at a Cal football game, what is Oski all about? How did the goofy grin, high-stepping gait, clasped hands and rumors of permanent intoxication become a Cal institution?
The story begins with an engineer, of course.
As a student at Long Beach Junior College in 1938, William Rockwell (B.S.'48 ME) was invited to fill the "Ole Olson the Viking" mascot suit for a school parade. Rockwell was shy and quiet, but disguised as a Viking, he became an outgoing, rabble-rouser of school spirit. When he transferred to Berkeley, he decided to volunteer his skills.
Before Rockwell arrived, the California Golden Bears used live ursine mascots with predictably unpredictable results so officials welcomed the new student's human interpretation. In the autumn of 1941, Rockwell donned a homemadebear head fashioned around a football helmet. He dressed in baggy pants, a large letter sweater, oversized shoes and white gloves. In front of thousands of Cal fans at Memorial Stadium, he led cheers, waved to children and flirted with girls. In later games, he walked on the crossbar between goalposts and tried to grab the football from referees. The bear never revealed his true identity to others.
Oski (named after lines from an old Berkeley cheer) became so popular that Rockwell's studies suffered. After flunking a midterm in ME 102, he enlisted in the Navy, served as a decorated fighter pilot in WWII, and after the war, returned to finish school. With his impending graduation, the engineer anticipated the need for a system to manage and guard Oski's identity year after year. Like so many academic institutions, Oski required a committee.
The Oski Committee thrives today. Its members are undergraduates who decide who will play Oski and who induct fellow committee members. Since the group is also pledged to secrecy and anonymity forever and ever, its workings are mysterious. What's not, though, is staff member Diane Milano, Cal Spirit adviser and "bear handler."
"I coordinate all Oski's appearances and manage his schedule and travel," she explains. "He appears at all the major sporting events plus 40 to 50 campus events a year. I also oversee the costume and coordinate repairs, replacements and cleaning. It's a hot outfit, and I'm always on them to air it out when they get back to the lair and spray some Febreeze in it."
Oski is an independent bear. He's not part of athletics, the Cal dance team, or the Rally Committee. His appearance fees go toward his own travel expenses and costume costs. His training is secretive, but Milano says she recently sent Oski to mascot camp for the first time ever. At camp, Oski learned a dance routine to "Surfin' USA" and somehow managed to maintain his secret identity, one of the few college mascots with such a policy. (Legend has it Oski even refused to remove his bear head in an ambulance.) Milano says she encourages the student playing Oski to work with a coach from the Theatre and Performance Department. Communication using body language is key, she says, as Oski doesn't speak.
He also no longer flirts with girls or flips up their skirts, explains Milano, due to sexual harassment policies. He no longer shimmies up the goal posts for threat of liability. He no longer climbs, defoliates, brawls with, or otherwise harasses the Stanford Tree per an agreement between the two universities. He no longer throws cake into the crowd at a basketball game or pie at an opposing chancellor. He does parktake of alcoholic beverages, though, and legend says he'll sometimes wander down from his lair in Strawberry Canyon to Henry's Publick House at the Hotel Durant. It's also rumored that Oski used to frequent the Bear's Lair on campus, funneling two steins through his eyehole, until he was carded by a bouncer.
Milano acknowledges Oski's reputation as a spirited drinker. In years past, the mascot has passed out on fraternity lawns and gone for joyrides on top of cars, only to fall off. "I trust him to be a good ambassador for Cal, and if he is drinking, that he's of age," she says. "Oski has a frisky side, but there's a fine line." The mascot is governed by a Code for Action, which says: "I'm OSKI. I'm never discourteous and although I may be slightly naughty at times, my naughtiness is in good taste…"
The year 1999 brought controversy. The ASUC Senate introduced a bill to update Oski's tubby, old-fashioned look. It was eventually vetoed, but not before the public came to his defense. Oski himself appeared at an ASUC meeting and scribbled on a blackboard: "For over 50 years, I have worked very hard to represent everything that is great about Cal. Please respect that."
William Rockwell, the original Oski, went on to become a design engineer for the U.S. Department of Agriculture and died in 2000. Like all great engineering projects, his Oski lives on. A shy engineer's solution to the university's mascot problem continues to charm the Cal community today.
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