UNC Chapel Hill: Rameses

The 1924 team had been in a slump and Carolina fans were looking for something to break the jinx. The Tar Heel sports staff joined the campus in hoping that the new mascot would bring the much-needed luck. 

In 1924 Vic Huggins, UNC's head cheerleader, decided that Carolina needed a mascot like N.C. State's Wolf and Georgia's Bulldog."School spirit was at a peak," Huggins once explained.At the time, Jack Merrit, known to his fans as the "Battering Ram," was a popular member of UNC's football team. The cheerleader went to Charles T. Woollen, the University's Business Manager, and asked him to find twenty-five dollars to buy a ram. They ordered UNC's first mascot from Texas. Rameses the First was shipped in from Texas, arriving just in time to be introduced at a pep rally before the VMI game. Complete with a monogram blanket on his back, Rameses helped make the pep rally one of the school's greatest.

Then the ram was taken to Emerson Field where Carolina was an underdog to a strong VMI team. But, for three quarters the Tar Heels battled the visitors to a scoreless tie.

Late in the fourth period Carolina's Bunn Hackney was called upon to attempt a field goal. Before taking the field he stopped to rub Rameses' head for good luck.

Seconds later Hackney's 30-yard dropkick sailed between the goalposts, giving the Tar Heels a 3-0 victory and a legendary mascot.

Tar Heels rams have traveled everywhere from New York City (for the Carolina-Notre Dame game in 1949) to Jacksonville for Carolina's Gator Bowl appearances.Carolina fans credited the first Rameses' presence for pulling Carolina past VMI, and giving birth to the long line of rams who have witnessed Tar Heel games.