‘Tuscaloosa – Roll Tide!’ is the second part of a two-part story. It deals with everything connected with the University of Alabama. (To read the Part-I, click ‘Black Warrior Alert – Tuscaloosa’)
Tuscaloosa – Roll Tide!
Well, it is time to introduce you to some Tuscaloosa slang. In fact, just two phrases would do. First, Bama is Alabama for short and you will find this word used variously here. Right from the Bama Theatre, a hub of community events and cultural activity in Tuscaloosa, to Bama Belle, a pedal wheel cruiser on the Black Warrior River, you’ll find Bama everywhere.
The second phrase – Roll Tide – is a bit more complex. It originated as a clarion call for the Crimson Tide – University of Alabama’s Football Team. During a game, the crazed fans would urge their team to do better by screaming ‘Roll Tide’. But today, it could mean anything from hello to goodbye and all things in between. It is used as a phrase of hope, a grunt of disgust, a chuckle of ‘how-did-you-manage-to-get-into-this-mess’, an acknowledgement of ‘see-you-for-coffee-at-4′, and more. In fact, today it bonds not just the Tuscaloosa folks, but people across Alabama.
How did Roll Tide become all pervading?
Alabama’s Crimson Tide is one of the all-time ‘Top 5’ college football teams in the US. In fact, it has won 4 national titles in the last 10 years alone, including the 2017 title! For a town with a population of 100,000, such victories are a heady mix. Their weddings get planned around the football calendar – they want their friends around when an important match has to happen. Important social events avoid any clash of dates with a football match. In short, college football is as much a part of life for a Tuscaloosa family as breakfast. It is like cricket and Bollywood for India.
Little wonder the team’s call of inspiration is today a bond that unites the people of Tuscaloosa.
So why did I talk about ‘Roll Tide’?
The sprawling university campus is spread over an area of almost 2000 acre and is seamlessly intertwined with the town. The centrepiece of this gigantic campus is the Bryant-Denny Football Stadium – the home stadium of Crimson Tide. Its location and history make it an intrinsic part of Tuscaloosa’s folklore. Interestingly, the Bryant-Denny Stadium seats almost 102,000 people while the population of the city is a shade fewer than 100,000!
Like most football stadia, even Bryant-Denny Stadium is rich in infrastructure. Besides the usual offices, team, and visitors changing rooms, conference rooms, auditoriums, cheerleaders’ room, a walk of champions, etc., it also houses a memorabilia museum. No trip around the city is complete without visiting the hallowed innards of this magnificent stadium.
In fact, a small but popular eatery just outside the stadium – Rama Jama’s – has further iconised Crimson Tide’s achievements. They serve a Champions Burger that has over a pound of meat including 16 strips of bacon – one for each year the team won the National Championship. I am sure now they would have added another strip as in 2017, Crimson Tide has won their 17th Championship too!
And while you checking all this out, knowing about the significance and meaning of Roll Tide becomes necessary. So necessary that if you do not understand the phrase, you can never hope to have any meaningful conversation with any resident of Tuscaloosa!
What about the University of Alabama (UA)?
In Tuscaloosa Part-I, I had mentioned the town was the capital of Alabama for 20 years – from 1826 to 1846. During that period, in 1831, the University of Alabama was founded. Over the last 185+ years, the University is inextricably woven into the fabric of the town. Its sprawling campus is both – eye-pleasing and strewn with iconic institutions. I will talk more about these a little later.
As the educational hub, it not only manages the immediate campus but also manages the multiple educational research centres and facilities in and around Tuscaloosa. One such facility of note is the Moundville.
Moundville lays about 25-km from Tuscaloosa. This 320-acre park contains numerous prehistoric earthwork mounds and burial sites. These are linked with the Mississippian culture era of Native Americans i now established. The larger mounds lie closer to the Black Warrior River. As one goes farther from the river, the mounds become smaller. This receding size might well be an indication of the relative ranks of the builders of these mounds.
The small museum called Jones Archeological Museum at Moundville attempts to recreate the prehistoric era through dioramas and various other audio-visual techniques. While it is interesting to understand the more recent history of this town, a visit to Moundville accords you a glimpse into prehistoric Tuscaloosa!
UA Campus
This enormous campus has almost 300 buildings containing over 10.5 million sq. ft. of space! The general layout of the campus is stringing together of multiple quadrangles – each quad being either a specific department or a specific set of institutions.
While the campus has been continuously growing ever since it was instituted and has numerous modern buildings, some of the historical buildings of note include the President’s Mansion, Denny Chimes, McLure Library, Foster Auditorium (a National Historic Landmark), Russell Hall, Maxwell Observatory, Gorgas-Manly Historic District, and Morgan Auditorium. Additionally, UA boasts some of the most outstanding theatres like Allen Bales Theatre, Marion Gallaway Theatre, and the Frank M. Moody Music Building that houses the Tuscaloosa Symphony Orchestra and the UA Opera Theatre.
Jewels in the Crown
And then, there are two jewels in the crown of the UA campus – The Alabama Museum of Natural History at Smith Hall and The Paul W. Bryant Museum. The Natural History Museum has numerous exhibits ranging from the largest meteorite that struck a human being, to a complete skeleton of a dinosaur. And the Bryant Museum houses the memorabilia on the glorious history of UA’s athletic programme, most notably the tenure of football coach Paul ‘Bear’ Bryant.
Given the football-fetish of the town, honouring Bryant comes naturally. In his 25-year tenure as head coach, he helped the team win 6 national championships and 13 conference championships. When he retired in 1982, he held the record for most wins as head coach in college football history – a mind-numbing 323 wins!
In conclusion, I am sure you would agree that Tuscaloosa, University of Alabama and Roll Tide are inextricably linked and talking of one without the other is definitely out. So, as and when you visit Tuscaloosa, just say ‘Roll Tide’ and you would find the town is your friend!
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Good job sir…keep it up
Thanks, Neha! Now, this is all I do 🙂