SDSU professor revives fight to change Aztec mascot

A San Diego State University professor is bringing up a new argument to revisit an old fight.

American Indian Studies professor Ozzie Monge would like his school to drop its Aztec mascot, which he finds racist, and replace it with a non-human character.

Others have asked for the mascot to be dropped because they see it as racist, but he is adding a new objection to his case.

Monge says the school should have never adopted the mascot in the first place because it perpetuates the misconception that the Aztecs lived in the southwest United States.

So why did SDSU adopt as a mascot a people who lived 1,000 miles away and centuries ago? As Monge explains, it’s a story tied to Mexican nationalism, inaccurate history, masculine pride and even a conspiracy involving the media and a coach.

Also, there’s a cat with 26 toes.

The Aztecs lived about 1,000 miles away in central Mexico, but using their image has left people believing they were a local tribe, he said.

“This is a public university,” Monge said. “We’re not supposed to perpetuate ignorance. We’re suppose to be seekers of truth and knowledge, and the fact is that we continue to foist this ridiculous idea on students, on the faculty and the public. It’s counter to our mission statement.”

Monge laid out his case for changing the mascot in “Fail Montezuma,” a thesis he presented last year to earn a master of arts in liberal arts and sciences.

He said he plans to appear before the Faculty Senate and Associated Students to make his argument to change the mascot in the near future.

Monge is far from the first to try to change the mascot, and all before him have been unsuccessful. The Associated Students last considered changing the mascot in spring of 2015, and voted was 24-1 to keep it.

“What I’m doing that’s different is examining how it came about in the first place,” he said.

In explaining how the Aztecs became the SDSU mascot, Monge’s thesis goes back about 200 years.

Following Mexico’s independence from Spain in 1821, the new federal government used the Aztecs, which were dominate in the 14th to 16th centuries, as a unifying symbol of the country, Monge said.

The idea that the Aztecs represented all of Mexico stuck with Americans after the Mexican-American War ended in 1848. Explorers in newly annexed land in the Arizona territory believed any ruins they found must have come from the Aztecs, Monge wrote in his thesis.

Historian William H. Prescott furthered the misconception by speculating that the Aztecs had come to Mexico from the American Southwest.

The idea became so accepted that a chief justice from El Paso suggested that the capital of the Territory of Arizona be named Azlán in memory of the ancient Aztec empire he believed once was on the land.

The name didn’t stick, but main streets in the new town were named Cortez and Montezuma. Miners in the Agua Fria River Valley called their gold camp Montezuma City, and ruins in Arizona left by the Sinagua people were incorrectly named Montezuma Castle, a name that remains today.

Historian Hubert Bancroft tried to set people straight by writing that naming things in the Southwest after the Aztecs was historically wrong, but he apparently had no influence over what was to happen at the predecessor of SDSU a few years after his death in 1918.

Monge’s research relies heavily on SDSU professor Seth Mallios’ book “Hail Montezuma” to explain the origins of the Aztec mascot.

In 1915, back when SDSU was on Park Boulevard and called the San Diego Normal School, the student newspaper the Paper Lantern reported that a cat with six extra toes had become the school’s mascot after it began appearing on campus.

Someone familiar with folklore named it the Wampus Cat after a mythical creature that sometimes was described as having extra limbs.

By the 1923-24 football season, the school paper was promoting the Wampus Cats as the name for its team.

The team and coach, however, might not have been on board with a mascot that had their rivals calling them “the kitties,” Monge suggests.

“It’s quite likely that the emasculation of the team moniker probably didn’t sit very well with Coach (Charles) Peterson,” Monge wrote in his thesis.

Also in his thesis, Monge noted a Jan. 14, 1925 article in the school paper that reported a committee made up of Peterson and others were considering the Thoroughbreds, Balboans and Panthers as possible names for mascots that had been submitted by the student body.

One week later, an article about the school’s debate team appeared with the headline, “Aztecs Tackle Ancient Rivals in Debate Soon.”

“Aztecs?” Monge wrote. “Where in the heck did THAT come from?”

Monge retold a story from “Hail Montezuma” about student Fred Osenberg, a writer for The Paper Lantern and contributor to the San Diego Evening Tribune, coming up with the idea for the Aztecs while visiting a museum in Balboa Park.

“There were pictures of temples from the Mayan regions,” Monge said. “It made him think of Aztecs, because they really believed that the Aztecs were here.”

In what he described as a “coup,” Monge suggests Osenberg conspired with Peterson to promote the name Aztecs along with the help of fellow student Lewis Schellback, who also wrote for The Paper Lantern and The San Diego Union.

He also quotes from Mallios’ “Hail Montezuma,” which noted that the student government allegedly was not happy with how the decision was made.

Monge’s argument to change the name doesn’t rest entirely on its historical inaccuracy. He said he sees it as cultural appropriation, which the school and the Greek system say is unacceptable.

He also argues that the name leads to misunderstanding about local history. Monge said he has asked random students to name a local Indian tribe, and most will answer Aztecs or have no answer at all.

Many alumni, students and faculty members have defended the Aztec mascot. Matt Dathe, who graduated in 1990, sat on a committee in the early 2000s to study whether the mascot should be changed and said he is not too impressed with Monge’s new argument.

“The Aztecs were from central Mexico,” he said. “I don’t see any misconception at all about that.”

Dathe said he doesn’t think the mascot leads people to think the Aztecs were a local tribe. If anything, he said he believe students are more likely to learn the real history of the Aztecs because of its association with their school.

He also said he sees the Aztecs as fierce and powerful, and he feels proud in seeing the mascot at games.

Dathe also that after a lengthy discussion about the issue, the final decision was to keep the mascot.

“This has kind of been asked and answered,” he said. “It’s fine to talk about things, but this was a serious distraction. I’d hate to see us go down this road again.”

In 2002, SDSU replaced the spear-throwing Monty Montezuma mascot who appeared at sporting events with a milder Ambassador Montezuma, who wore authentic clothing and lectured on cultural and history of the Aztecs. He didn’t go over well, and the school later brought back Monty.

gary.warth@sduniontribune.com

Twitter: @GaryWarthUT

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