2008 Woodie Awards
Baring it all for a cause
Matthew Schroyer
Issue date: 10/12/07 Section: 50th Anniversary Special Edition
They plotted in the basement men's restroom of the University Center. There, they parted with their clothes, except for a cowboy hat or a ski mask in some cases, all the while whooping and building up the courage to face the crowds.
"It's nice and warm outside," the organizer said in an Alestle interview, as reported in the newspaper's March 8, 1974, edition. "It seemed like a good day to have a streak on this campus."
Outside, a crowd of more than 2,000 waiting in the UC and in the quadrangle began to get weary. But, at 12:30 p.m., they got what they came for.
Bounding through the cafeteria, up the stairs to the Goshen Lounge and out the front doors, about two dozen people ran. And the audience screamed. Bearing all and leaving nothing to shame, the freak streak ran through the Stratton Quadrangle (then known as "the mall") and crammed into waiting cars on Circle Drive.
All did not make a clean getaway. Seven people were arrested in connection with the streak, after being pulled over as they attempted to get away. Six in the car were men, all but one in the buff. The other male and the female driver were clothed.
The events of that Thursday in March, 1974, were repeated on a slightly smaller scale the next day. Friday, about 20 convened at Chimega's cage at 12:30 p.m., and ran from the University Center, across "the mall," toward the back of the library, in the nude.
As quick as the runners who carried the streaking movement, the phenomenon vanished. The fad was finished, never to return to SIUE. But where did these bare-all bandits come from? And where did the movement run to?
Sociologist Mark Hedley, who received his doctorate in 1994 from the University of Arizona and is a scholar of gender and sexuality, sees a correlation between streaking and the sexual revolution of the 1960s and 1970s.
"(It was) the treatment of the human body as natural and beautiful rather than obscene, and their treatment of sex as potentially for pleasure rather than simply for reproduction," Hedley said.
"It's nice and warm outside," the organizer said in an Alestle interview, as reported in the newspaper's March 8, 1974, edition. "It seemed like a good day to have a streak on this campus."
Outside, a crowd of more than 2,000 waiting in the UC and in the quadrangle began to get weary. But, at 12:30 p.m., they got what they came for.
Bounding through the cafeteria, up the stairs to the Goshen Lounge and out the front doors, about two dozen people ran. And the audience screamed. Bearing all and leaving nothing to shame, the freak streak ran through the Stratton Quadrangle (then known as "the mall") and crammed into waiting cars on Circle Drive.
All did not make a clean getaway. Seven people were arrested in connection with the streak, after being pulled over as they attempted to get away. Six in the car were men, all but one in the buff. The other male and the female driver were clothed.
The events of that Thursday in March, 1974, were repeated on a slightly smaller scale the next day. Friday, about 20 convened at Chimega's cage at 12:30 p.m., and ran from the University Center, across "the mall," toward the back of the library, in the nude.
As quick as the runners who carried the streaking movement, the phenomenon vanished. The fad was finished, never to return to SIUE. But where did these bare-all bandits come from? And where did the movement run to?
Sociologist Mark Hedley, who received his doctorate in 1994 from the University of Arizona and is a scholar of gender and sexuality, sees a correlation between streaking and the sexual revolution of the 1960s and 1970s.
"(It was) the treatment of the human body as natural and beautiful rather than obscene, and their treatment of sex as potentially for pleasure rather than simply for reproduction," Hedley said.
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