Bag rush

Photographer

Meuer, William

Date

• April 19, 1919

Summary

• Scene at the 1919 bag rush at the University of Wisconsin--Madison. For fifteen minutes before one of the early football games of the year, the men of the freshman and sopomore classes fought for 15 straw-filled gunny sacks placed on the lower campus in what is now Library Mall. The victors paraded their trophies through campus, up State Street and around the capital. The junior class organized a police force which attempted to keep order. The bag rush replaced the earlier lake rush in 1909.