{Editor's note: In preparation for this year's Border War, RMN reader Keith Piontek has authored a four-part series on the origins of the Missouri/Kansas rivalry. Today, we wrap up the series with part four.}

"When KU football players first took the field in 1890,
it seemed only natural to call them Jayhawkers."

(Official KU web site, Traditions at the University, The Jayhawk.)[1]

Given the odious nature of the original Kansas jayhawkers, how did the jayhawker term come to be embraced by Kansans, and later by KU?  Does the legacy of the original jayhawkers endure? 

[1] http://www.ku.edu/about/traditions/jayhawk.shtml

What Was a Jayhawker?

First, the meaning of the jayhawker term during the Kansas territorial period and the Civil War will be reviewed.

KU professor Spring, who wrote his 1896 Kansas history based on extensive first hand accounts, had the following description of the original jayhawkers, men from southeast Kansas during the territorial period, "Confederated at first for defense against pro-slavery outrages, but ultimately falling more or less completely into the vocation of robbers and assassins, they have received the name --- whatever its origin may be -- of jayhawkers." [1] 

The term came into wider use during the Civil War.  In 1861, A Kansas judge offered the following definition.  "I feel it to be my duty, Gentlemen of the Jury, to call your attention especially to a form of lawlessness commonly denominated "jayhawking."  It seems to be a word sufficiently comprehensive to embrace in its signification three of the worst crimes known to criminal jurisprudence, namely, murder, robbery and larceny.  It is a monster of Western birth; and its defenders claim that Kansas has the honor of the birth-place.  Insidious in its presentiments, it assumes to aid in the suppression of rebellion and the punishment of treason; and it thus endeavors to insinuate itself into the tolerance of loyal citizens by pretending to be clothed in the garb of patriotism." [2]  Using the term in a similar manner, the Union command in Kansas issued an 1862 proclamation ordering the arrest of "armed bands of men, commonly known as "Jayhawkers" that "continue to infest the country, committing depredations and outrages on peaceable citizens". [3]

The jayhawker term did not have a more favorable connotation north of Kansas.  In 1862, the Governor of Nebraska Territory was compelled to issue a "cease and desist" proclamation concerning the "lawless bands of armed men, styling themselves Jayhawkers" that were "committing depredations in the Southern portion of the Territory – stealing horses, robbing stores and houses, and threatening the lives of many of the citizens" [4]  Earlier, Nebraska residents had believed the propaganda attempting to cloak the actions of the jayhawkers as retaliatory and/or directed solely toward secessionists.  However, over time, "it became apparent to all that the true definition of jayhawking signified a thief, and that the prime object of the jayhawkers was robbery."[5]    

The jayhawker term did not have a more favorable connotation southeast of Kansas.  In Arkansas during the Civil War, the term jayhawker was a derogatory term for any troops from Kansas.  "However, so notorious did the destructive behavior of the Kansans become that Confederate Arkansans also used the name as an epithet for any marauder, robber, or thief…Jayhawkers would always be linked to Kansas, but so notorious had the violence perpetrated by early Kansas raiders become that the nature of the deed, rather than any geographical place, came to define the (jayhawker) name.[6]

It is doubtful that the jayhawker term had a more honorable meaning south of Kansas in the Indian Territories, where "bands of guerillas called Kansas Jay Hawkers" pillaged and burned the homes of the "Civilized Tribes" that had aligned with the Confederacy, and where approximately 300,000 head of cattle were rustled from Native Americans (irregardless of their Confederate or Union affiliation) by unprincipled men operating out of Kansas.[7], [8]   

Perhaps with this backdrop of what the term meant in Kansas and among its non-Missouri neighbors, the reader will not so readily dismiss the following definition of jayhawkers by an admittedly biased Missourian of the era.  "The original Jayhawker was a growth indigenous to the soil of Kansas...In some respects a mountebank, in others a scoundrel, and in all a thief - he was a character eminently adapted for civil war which produces more adventurers than heroes… The type was all of a kind. The mouth generally wore a calculating smile - the only distinguishable gift remaining of a Puritan ancestry - but when he felt that he was looked at the calculating smile became sanctimonious. Slavery concerned him only as the slaveholder was supposed to be rich...Born to nothing, and eternally out at the elbows, what else could he do but laugh and be glad when chance kicked a country into war and gave purple and fine linen to a whole lot of bummers and beggars?"[9]

Kansas Embraces the Jayhawker Moniker

Given the unsavory connotations of the jayhawker term during the Civil War, it is a wonder that the sobriquet came to be embraced by Kansans.  Writing in the early 1900’s, a Kansan pondered this development.  "Kansas aspires to be called the "Jayhawker State".  Our most illustrious citizens hail the name as a badge of honor.  Our great university perpetuates the name in its war cry that celebrates victory or shouts defiance after stubborn defeat. How came dishonor to be purified?... How…was the miracle accomplished?" [10]

Indeed, how was the miracle accomplished?  Unfortunately, the author that posed this question did not provide a very definitive answer.  The author made a case that it was the Seventh Kansas Volunteer Cavalry (also known as Jennison’s Jayhawkers), through their honorable service to the Union once free of the corrupting influences of Jennison and Hoyt, which caused Kansans to embrace the term.  Several factors suggest this is not the whole story.  First, the article was written by a member of the Seventh Kansas (a clearly biased source).  Second, it is hard to believe the actions of a single regiment of less than 1,000 men serving in the relatively obscure campaigns of the western theatre, hundreds of miles from Kansas, had such a profound impact on the people of Kansas.  Third, a similar article, written by a member of the Fifteenth Kansas, makes a case that is was the actions of their unit, in this case acting under the superb leadership of Jennison and Hoyt, that "converted the appellation of 'jayhawkers' into one of honor and fame."[11]  So, which is to be believed, was the miracle accomplished by the Seventh once it was free of the odious Jennison, or by the Fifteenth under the command of the noble Jennison?  Together, these articles may it clear the jayhawker term and Jennison were most definitely associated, but they fail to provide a convincing explanation of why Kansans embraced the term.   

The origin of the "jayhawk" moniker was addressed by Dr. Blackmar, the first dean of KU’s graduate school, in a 1926 radio address.  Blackmar acknowledged that "jayhawking" had become a general term to express marauding or plundering, theorized that the popular nickname of the Seventh Kansas Cavalry may have been a factor, but stated "it is not known how the name gradually became applied to all residents of Kansas." [12] 

Is it really such as mystery?  The contemporaneous opinions of Kansans on the practice of jayhawking itself offer clues.  After a thorough survey of the Kansas press of the period and of other contemporary records, one noted Civil War historian concluded, "Kansans generally approved the forays of the jayhawkers through the border counties of Missouri (in 1861-62). Their growing anti­slavery fervor caused them to applaud the slave-liberating aspect of these operations, espe­cially since the freed Negroes relieved the labor shortage in Kansas. True, exaggerated, and false reports of outrages suffered by Kansans and Missouri Union­ists at the hands of Missouri secessionists seemed to warrant retaliation in kind. In addition, the people of Kansas had a distorted concept of the object and nature of the activities of Lane, Jennison, Anthony, and James H. Lane. They believed that their campaigns and raids were designed to put down "treason" and guard against invasion, while the newspaper correspondents who accompanied Lane's brigade and the Seventh Kansas wrote up the supposedly heroic exploits of these commands and either ignored or glossed over the looting and killing. Finally, there was a rather sizeable element in Kansas which out of economic and moral poverty was quite willing to advocate and practice the plundering of the farmers of western Missouri, who had "a dangerous reputa­tion for wealth."[13] 

Thus, we see that while jayhawking was an activity that encompassed despicable crimes, Kansans generally approved the forays of the jayhawkers.  Why?  There were a variety of reasons that included ignorance of what the jayhawkers were truly up to, economic and moral poverty, and an attitude that the "Missourians deserved it".  The lack of sympathy for the Missouri victims was undoubtedly and understandably exacerbated in the wake of Quantrill’s raid.  One newspaper that had voiced opposition to the jayhawkers now called for punishing western Missouri.  "These marauders from Missouri have set "mischief afloat," and woe betide their sympathizers all along the border.  Their acts of vandalism, of fiendish barbarism, have knit the hearts of our people into one.  They must be punished and exterminated wherever found.  The sword of vengeance is unsheathed; let it not rest or be stayed from its fearful mission, until it has purchased at the cost of much blood, perfect immunity from such terrible calamities as have befallen our State in the burning of Lawrence."[14]  Never mind that Quantrill and his raiders believed they themselves had been on a mission of justice and vengeance against the earlier depredations of the jayhawkers and redlegs.  In the downward spiral into total way, perspective and sympathy for the innocent go by the wayside.  Apparently, Kansans had become blinded to the outrages committed by their own. 

Certainly, after the conclusion of the Civil War, Kansans were justifiably proud of the state’s contributions to the preservation of the Union and the end of slavery.  But why embrace the jayhawker term, a word with such unsavory connotations?  Part of the Jayhawk mythology propagated by KU is as follows: "During the Civil War the word Jayhawk became associated with the spirit of comradeship associated with efforts to keep Kansas a free state. And following the war most Kansans were proud to be called Jayhawkers."[15]  Based on the information presented in this series of articles, there are at least two explanations for the first sentence in this particular KU claim: 1) it is more or less a complete fabrication and a whitewash of the ugly historical reality, and 2) the virtuous meaning was generally limited to only those living within the Kansas borders.  Because the definition of the jayhawker term has varied in space and time, it is hard to pin down exactly what was meant by the term to whom, and when.  However, it is pretty clear that in the immediate aftermath of the Civil War, not many (if any) outside the state of Kansas associated the term with anything as laudable as comradeship.    

Perhaps the most likely explanation is that as "jayhawkers" began to come into use as a derogatory term for all Kansan troops, some Kansans with knowledge of the term’s true meaning embraced the term out of a sanctimonious or mean-spirited pride, while the term was embraced by other Kansans with a pride that was ignorant of or blinded to the ugly reality.  In defense of Kansans of the era, the latter group probably outnumbered the former. 

One would suspect the KU administration was comprised of men with enough education to have knowledge of the jayhawkers’ considerable dark side.  Why would KU embrace the name?  Perhaps they were sanctimonious enough to believe that the activities of the jayhawkers, no matter how despicable, were justified by their alignment, no matter how loose, with the causes of Union and Abolition.  Perhaps they believed the reality of the jayhawkers could be whitewashed through the mythology that was being written as history by the Civil War victors. This theory is supported by the KU administration’s demonstrated willingness to deliberately distort early Kansas history (albeit, in what was perhaps an isolated case).[16]  Perhaps the KU administration felt it was a "plus" to pick a name that would rankle the Missourians. 

Regardless of the reason(s), the KU decision to select the jayhawker moniker was a key milestone in the spirited rivalry with MU that lives on to this day. 

The Jayhawker Legacy

For as long as the KU athletic teams are named the Jayhawks, the legacy of the original jayhawkers will live on in one very obvious way.   Are there other ways in which the jayhawker legacy lives on? 

Periodically, the KU football team will don red socks.  The fact that the red socks are often worn only for the annual game with MU suggests this is not merely a KU attempt to be fashionable.[17]  During the Civil War, the Kansas Red Legs were a particularly nasty variant of the jayhawkers.  Before Lawrence, Kansas became home to KU, it served as a red leg headquarters.  One of the early Kansas histories, written in by a KU professor in 1896, stated that the gang of red legs based in Lawrence "contained men of the most desperate and hardened character, and a full recital of their deeds would sound like the biography of devils. Either the people of Lawrence could not drive out the freebooters, or they thought it mattered little what might happen to Missouri disloyalists."[18]  It is one thing for KU and/or its fans to sugar-coat the linkage between the despicable deeds of the original jayhawkers and the current KU moniker.  It is considerably more difficult to argue that KU donning the red socks for the MU game is anything less than a symbolic "tip of the hat" to the Civil War-era Kansans that donned red leggings for their vicious raids into Missouri. 

To find other ways in which the jayhawker legacy lives on, one needs to look beyond the obvious.  Let us examine the culture engendered by the original jayhawkers.  A supporter of the jayhawkers wrote back in 1861, "Jayhawking was got up in Kansas.  It's one of our things.  It works well; we believe in it, we are going to have it.  It don't make any difference whether the authorities, civil or military, believe in it or not.  Kansas don't care much for authorities; never did, never will."[19]  The early history of Kansas was marked by extreme lawlessness that had created a group of men (i.e., the jayhawkers) with a "brazen disregard for law and order".[20]  These jayhawkers were not only tolerated, they were ultimately embraced by Kansans.  Once established, such a culture of lawlessness and disregard for authority, and the tolerance of these behaviors, is hard to change. 

Did this culture (albeit a watered down version) live on in the annals of the KU athletic program?  The reader may be familiar with the fact that KU is among the nation’s leaders in the number of times it has been placed on probation by the NCAA for major rules infractions, but the reader may not be aware that the KU cheating pre-dates the NCAA and has been going on since the earliest years of KU athletics. 

KU’s undefeated football season in 1899 was aided by the appearance of a mammoth tackle named Rollo Krebs for the final games of the season.  In the season finale against Missouri, two Missouri lineman who had attempted to stop Krebs were carried from the field on stretchers, and KU prevailed by the score of 34 – 6.  KU students planned a celebration in Krebs’ honor, but he had mysteriously disappeared.  The mystery of the "phantom tackle" was solved several decades later when Krebs returned to Lawrence as a guest of honor the day before the 1934 Missouri game.  Krebs admitted that prior to his brief stint with the jayhawkers, he had played five years of varsity football for the University of West Virginia and had also spent a year in the professional ranks.  The KU staff had essentially imported a mercenary to help beat Missouri. [21]  

KU won an upset victory over the Tigers in 1927 aided by Tiger play charts that had been provided to the KU staff.  This was in violation of a league agreement to not scout opposing teams, and led to the resignation of KU’s head coach.

Many Tiger fans are aware of the 1960 season finale between MU and KU, the KU upset that gave the Tigers their only loss of the season and prevented the Tigers from being named national champions, and the subsequent KU forfeit of the contest for their use of a player (Bert Coan) that had been illegally recruited by KU off another college campus.  Most MU fans are unaware that it wasn’t the first time KU had pulled the stunt. 

KU’s outstanding 1930 team was paced by star halfback "Jarring Jim" Bausch (an exceptional all-around athlete that later won a gold medal in the 1932 Olympic decathlon).  Midway through the season, charges surfaced that Bausch was receiving a monthly check from a booster, thus explaining his questionable transfer to KU from Wichita University (later, Wichita State).  After KU refused to declare Bausch ineligible, the other members of the Bix Six conference notified KU that, "In view of the practices at the University of Kansas in violating the rules of this conference relating to recruiting and subsidizing athletes, the other five members of this conference decline to schedule any athletic games, not now under contract, with the University of Kansas…"[22]  In essence, KU was being kicked out of the conference for their cheating.  In response, KU announced they would conduct an investigation, but as they considered the current evidence inadequate, they would allow Bausch to continue his play.  Only after KU had their first Big 6 conference title safely tucked away did KU declare Bausch ineligible.  One writer commented, "Kansas put up a big front at the start of the mess but every front has a back and that back was a streak of yellow." [23]

In his 1926 radio address on the Jayhawk moniker, KU’s Dean Blackmar had stated, "The Jayhawk myth has become a spirit of progress and power. Gone is the spirit of robber birds; gone the reckless spirit of the law and disorder bands of the stress and storm period."[24]  Based on the 1927 and 1930 cheating incidents described above, it appears that in his 1926 address, Blackmar had prematurely declared the demise of the original jayhawkers’ culture.  After the NCAA was given the authority to enforce its rules in 1952, KU was found guilty by the NCAA of major rule violations in 1957, 1960, 1972, 1983, 1988, and 2006. 

Just as the original jayhawkers ignored the rule of law, the KU athletic programs have a long track record of ignoring the rules of fair play.  When the NCAA cited KU in 2006 for "lack of institutional control" that had led to dozens of violations in the KU athletic programs, was that evidence that KU still "don’t care much for authorities"?  Even without the Jayhawk moniker and the periodic donning of red leggings, one could make a case the jayhawker legacy has indeed lived on!

_____________________________

In the last section of this article, where the long and storied tradition of KU cheating is discussed, I have gone beyond a  presentation of history (albeit from a Missouri perspective) and into the realm of partisan trash-talking.  If any KU fans happen across this, I hope they accept my remarks about the jayhawkers’ enduring legacy in the not-entirely-serious spirit they are offered.  As long as KU has that Jayhawk moniker, Border War history will be an unavoidable part of the rivalry banter.  It is time to move past the hate, so hopefully not too many are offended at this attempt to end on a historical perspective that is somewhat lighter than the mayhem of the original jayhawkers and bushwhackers.       

Keith Piontek
November 2008

[1] Spring, Leverett Wilson.  Kansas, The Prelude to the War for the Union.  New York: Boston Houghton, Mifflin and Company, 1896.   

[2] Daily Times [Leavenworth, KS], November 5, 1861, p. 2, c. 3.

[3] Order of Brigadier General Denver, Headquarters, District of Kansas, April 6, 1862,  Published in the New York Times, April 27, 1862. 

[4] Proclamation of Alvin Sanders, Governor of Nebraska Territory, January 2, 1862.  Published in the New York Times, January 19, 1862. 

[5] Andreas' History of the State of Nebraska (1882) - Nemaha County. Part 2.

[6] Daniel E. Sutherland.  Jayhawkers and Bushwackers.  The Encylcopedia of Arkansas History and Culture.  http://www.encyclopediaofarkansas.net

[7] Moore, Jesse Randolph.  The Five Great Indian Nations.  The Chronicles of Oklahoma, Volume 29, No. 3, pages 333-334.  1951. 

[8] Monaghan, Jay.  Civil War on the Western Border, 1864-1865.  University of Nebraska Press.  Original Copyright 1955.  Page 305. 

[9] John N. Edwards.  "Noted Guerrillas - Or The Warfare Of The Border." 1877. From Chapter 5 - "Quantrell And The Kansas Jayhawkers."

[10] Fox, S.M.  The Early History of the Seventh Kansas Cavalry.  Kansas State Historical Society, Volume XI, 19093-1911.

[11] Museum of the Kansas National Guard, Historic Units, The 15th Kansas Volunteer Cavalry.  http://www.kansasguardmuseum.org/15ksvls.html

[12] Blackmar, F.W.  Origin of the Jayhawk.  Delivered on the Annual KU Radio Nite Program, December, 1926.  Transcribed on the official KU web site: KU History and Traditions, The Legend of the Jayhawk. http://www.union.ku.edu/legend.shtml

[13] Castel, Albert.  Kansas Jayhawking Raids Into Western Missouri in 1861.  Missouri Historical Review 54/1.  October 1959.   

[14] Daily Times [Leavenworth, KS], August 22, 1863, p. 2, c. 1

[15] History of the Jayhawk.  As reported in the 1995-96 KU Basketball Media Guide.  http://www.rockchalk.com/john/john/jhwk.html

[16] Griffin, C.S.  The University of Kansas and the Sack of Lawrence: A Problem of Intellectual Honesty.  Kansas Historical Quarterly, Winter, 1968 (Vol. XXXIV. No. 4), pages 409 to 426.

[17] Kealing, Jonathan.  Anatomy of a rivalry, Border hostilities run deep.  Lawrence Journal-World.  Friday, November 23, 2007.  http://www2.kusports.com/news/2007/nov/23/anatomy_rivalry/?print

[18] Spring, Leverett Wilson.  Kansas, The Prelude to the War for the Union.  New York: Boston Houghton, Mifflin and Company, 1896.  

[19] Conservative [Leavenworth, KS], September 20, 1861

[20] Donald L. Gilmore.  Civil War on the Missouri-Kansas Border. Pelican Publishing Company, 2006.  page 162. 

[21] Evans, Harold C.  College Football in Kansas.  Kansas Historical Quarterly, August 1940 (Volume 9, No. 3), pages 285-311.

[22] Bob Broeg.  Ol’ Mizzou, A Story of Missouri Football.  The Strode Publishers, 1974.  page 102. 

[23] Schmidt, Ray.  Some 1920s Disputes.  College Football Historical Society Newsletter.  Vol. XIV, Issue II, Pages 9-12.

[24] Blackmar, Dr. F.W.  Origin of the Jayhawk.  Delivered on the Annual KU Radio Nite Program, December, 1926.  As transcribed on the KU website: www.union.ku.edu/legend.