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Page 10/The Batta I ion/Monday, November 28,1983
Aggie Bonfire 1983
Bonfire efforts praised
by Christine Mallon
and Steve Thomas
Battalion Staff
The stack was shorter, the
weather was better, the spirit
was stronger — it all added up to
one of the best Aggie bonfires in
years.
“This year’s bonfire was
probably one of the most orga
nized ones we’ve had at Texas
A&M in a long time,” Scott
Strom, a junior bonfire coordi
nator, said Sunday.
The most important factor
that contributed to the success of
bonfire this year, Strom said,
was the donations given to the
bonfire fund by alumni, stu
dents, faculty and local mer
chants.
“We don’t have any final fi
gures yet on how much bonfire
cost to build this year or how
much money we raised through
donations because it’s hard to
define what should be counted
as a cash donation,” Strom said.
For example, H.B. Zachry,
class of ’22, donated a new crane
to be used at the bonfire site and
Zachry paid for all operating
costs, Strom said.
Most of the money in the bon
fire fund is used to cover insur
ance costs, which usually are a
little more than $3,000, Strom
said.
Every student working at the
cutting site or at the stack is co
vered under a bonfire insurance
policy, he said, and all of the
vehicles used also are covered
for any major repairs.
Strom said most of the finan
cial support came from local
citizens and merchants.
Arthur Collier, of Collier
Electronics in Bryan, donated a
shack which was used for stor
age at the stack site and he also
donated all the electrical sup
plies which were used, Strom
said.
This year’s Bonfire Benefit
Barbeque, right after the Texas
A&M — University of Houston
football game, was dedicated to
Collier.
About 5,500 different people
worked on this year’s bonfire,
including the women’s dorms —
that’s about one person per log,
Strom said.
“Oh well, it stood about an
hour — which meant the Aggies
would at least do good in the first
quarter,” he said.
“It was one of the prettiest
fires I’ve ever seen,” said Paul
Tomaso, a civilian bonfire coor
dinator. Tomaso said bonfire
construction went well this year,
partly because there were few
accidents and partly because the
weather was so good. He
thought it was the best built stack
in four or five years.
Eby said the job took about 50
working days.
People from both on and off
campus worked on the stack, but
Tomaso said it is dorm spirit and
comradery that really make it
work.
It takes a lot of time to build
the stack, but Tomaso says that’s
not an excuse for bad grades.
“People should know how to
budget their time,” he said. “I
have good grades and I worked
equipment.
“Half the fun of making bon
fire is doing it with an axe,”
Tomaso said. “And you’ll never
see a dorm log go down with
anything but an axe.”
It took about 68 truckloads of
between 100 and 200 logs to
meet the bonfire’s need for
wood, but Tomaso said there is
no destruction to the environ
ment.
The wood is cut from land
belonging to the Texas Municip
al Power Authority, he ex
plained, land that has been set
aside to be stripmined for coal.
All the trees on the land will be
destroyed and replanted later.