I attended A&M post Bonfire. I am just wondering from you older Ags what campus life was like leading up to bonfire. Looking at all the pictures, I wish I was part of all this excitement.

Pro-Bonfire! It hasn't been right since it fell.

[This message has been edited by SeaAg96 (edited 11/14/2007 5:01p).]

There was nothing like the moment Bonfire was lit.

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Bonfire night was the biggest party night of the year........best memories of A&M

It was really cool back when bonfire was behind Duncan. A short walk from my dorm and I was a this huge party with the towering inferno at the center! People would go park their trucks in a big ring around the stack with kegs and lawn chairs in the back.

However, it must have been pretty disconcerting to the homeowners across the street to see burning embers blanketing their neighborhood. My white car would be covered in black soot the next day.

incredible. It was simply amazing the way the campus came together and the memories of it all. Building it, cut, load, watching it burn, all of it. I really miss those days.

The bonfire was so big and impressive in real life, the pictures don't do it justice. Seeing 50K people out there to watch it burn was something else.

Not meant as a criticism of the poster, but more as an observation of how the times have changed, the fact that an Aggie has to ask this question is very, very sad. It's sad to those of us who got to experience it personally and it's very sad because although your ring and your diploma mean you are an Aggie without any limitation, you were deprived of one of the seminal Aggie experiences.

Let's hope it comes back and soon.

Everything was different then. I attended a&m twice...the first time from '95 - '00. The second time from '05 - '06.

Let me tell you, A&M was a different place with bonfire. It gave an entirely different feel to the whole fall semester. Cut was going on every weekend. Bonfire was a serious preasence from the beginning of the semester to the moment in burned.

My God, let me tell you, it was BY FAR the biggest party in Texas when it happened on campus. Block parties everywhere, kegs out in the streets. Everyone walked from whatever party they were near campus to bonfire for the ceremony. It was a ginormous affair.

I love A&M, but the place I went back to isnt quite the same place it was when bonfire was in full force. It seems a little less colorful now.

In memory of the 12 that passed, I just want to say that everyone misses you and may you rest in peace.

Underscribable. You had to experience it to understand the difference.
It has not been the same since. The sip game has lost some luster also because of no on campus bonfire.
It was a thrill to work on building the stack.
I can remember being awakened at 5 in the morning as a fish on the first day of cut in October. Chainsaws screaming up and down the hall. Pure gold memories.
Being so sore the next day I could not get out of bed because I spent the previous day helping lift 40 ft. long trees, minus the limbs, onto a flatbed truck.
I am thankful I got to experience it but am very sad that is it gone.
A big part of Texas A&M went with it.

without Bonfire it's hard to tell we are about to BTHOtu! You walk around campus and there is no "buzz" since Bonfire.

Cut was dirty, tiring, fun, hard, awesome.
Unload was dirty, tiring, fun, hard, awesome.
But, there's nothing like sitting in a 4th stack swing from midnight to 6AM.

I think the campus culture is definitely different now. But, back then (at least when I built it in '98 and '99) it's not like EVERYone was involved with Bonfire. I think the numbers were something like 5,000 total participants, but if you only count those who made most cuts, helped unload, and saw it through the building of stack, I'd bet there were less than 1,000. I could be wrong.

I was lucky enough to go to the last 11 Bonfires. There was nothing quite like feeling the heat from the burning stack on your face on a cold fall evening even though you might be hundreds of feet away.

There was nothing like it anywhere in the country. I this day of lawsuits and red tape, Bonfire was student built and controlled. I will always remember cooold nights tying logs with bailing wire from a trapeze on the 4th stack. Watching 20 chicks working together to carry 1 ton logs. The smell of jet fuel being sprayed onto the stack hours before it was lit. And the football team would get up on stage and do yells and talk about BEATING THE HELL OUT OF tu!! And when that baby burned, your face felt like it was smoldering from the heat.
I remember driving by the stack around Christmas and bonfire would still be burning.
TAMU Football has never been the same since........

Bonfire experience was just not one day for me. The whole fall semester was centered around bonfire. At the beginning of the fall semester, you saw the logs out in the field. Then center pole came up, then saw each layer of was put into place. It was the anticipation that built up through the semester that made it great for me.

As you were out during the fall at the chicken and other various places, you would talk with the guys about the progress and when they were going on stack to work. We would go out and watch the guys work late at night on the stack. Girls were not allowed on the stack, while I was there.

Bonfire was fall, football and tu.

Cut was the best but lighting it was something to behold. You could feel the heat from hundreds of feet away and that sucker would burn forever - sometimes there were still embers out on the drill field at Christmas break.

One of our bonfires burned while it snowed (pretty hard actually). I remember because the next day I had to take a skills test in skiing on Mt. Aggie, which was iced over. It was NOT designed for that! I went first and when the skis didn't bite in the ice, I went down on my back, ripping skin off all the way down. INstructor cancelled skills testing...nice guy. I did get an A though!

Honestly: does anyone think it will ever come back?



Damn, I hope it comes back.



I remember after '99, most of the parents of the 12 said their kids would've wanted it to keep burning.

Decade plan,
It is sad enough that new army doesnt know about
Bonfire, but also sad that they dont know about mt. aggie ether.
This thread is making me very nastalgic

All the blood, sweat, and blisters was always worth it once it was up. The nights when Bonfire burned families would get together old ags, young ags, baby ags, ag wannabes (and yes they were very welcome), sips, and strangers would come out and just have a good time. The excitement was always thick and you could cut it with a knife it was so real. It was great.

[This message has been edited by Old_Ag_91 (edited 11/15/2007 10:01a).]

It was unbelievable: dorm chiefs blaring their radios at 5:00 AM on weekend morning, running up and down the halls beating on doors with ax handles (or ax heads in GD's last year as a guy's dorm). Muddy, smelly grodes lying in every stairwell or hallway. Piles of mud in at the doors, buckets of urine that people were saving to play with at cut site.

Definitely the best part of A&M. Sure, cut and stack are "sober" events, but bud light printed the cut schedule on their cardboard cases.

I'm still pro-Bonfire, but it was desperately in need of an overhaul.

AusAg...it is sad, but there have been a LOT of great things to come down the pike since then. Not the least of which is The Zone seating area.

But it does sadden me every time I drive by the drill field and see the memorial - not only for who that represents but also for the loss of what it replaced.

I guess I've never specifically thought about the current students have never experienced Bonfire. That really sux. Stories can't even do it justice.

I remember when the stack "slumped" in '94...Our classes were unofficially cancelled so that we could get out there and rebuild it. We were up for at least 3 days straight humping logs out and back to the stack.

Second only to the Corps...Bonfire was the main focus of every Fall at school...

Maybe I'll wake the kids up with the Ax Handle on the door at 5 am....just for old times sake...

G-2 & K-2 '98

Bonfire was a life event. It was something that bonded us all together. Shaving hair into letters, huddling around fires to stay warm, centerpole going up, the contagious commrodary, the continuous construction, the growing anticipation of dark thirty building and building, torches flying high up onto the stacks, and then the warmth felt on faces hundreds of feet from the glowing blaze - nothing truly compares.

It was such an experience that molded and defined what it was like to be an Aggie and part of this great family of ours. A&M is still a great University, but so much has been lost. The tragedy was a tragedy in so many ways.

It makes me sad when I think of New Army never getting the chance to experience it. How can losing Bonfire not have changed the culture in Aggieland? It had to. Some much was built around it. It was the centerpiece of Aggie tradition.

I graduated in 2000. I was fortunate to experience the rebuild, Burn and also the collapse.

The school was better because of Bonfire IMO.

It was like Game Day everyday. You know that since of freshness in the air when the first cold front blows in. The feeling of giddyness because you know its coming soon. It was more exciting than when I was a kid seeing presents under the tree a week before Christmas. You drive by everyday and night and see the progress made by individuals representing a whole. The AGGIE BONFIRE

I remember everytime it is brought up, where I was and the exact conversation at 5:15 in the morning when I got the call.

The world stopped for 3 days in College Station. When class resumed I remember walking to class with those who went, how quite it was. I remember not even hearing a bird, or the shoes steps of people or even whispers of those who talked. Classes were half empty.

It was the quite sound of Death. Not only the ones who represented all of us, but the Death of Tradition. We all knew deep down it was over.

It was wierdly enough an awesome time to be an AGGIE. I will never forget it or hesitate to tell anyone how special Bonfire was.

I am glad some have kept the tradtion alive the best they can.

Damn, I love A&M

Very good question. Everyone who has memories keep writing so the one that have never been to one can see what they and the school is missing. It't more than just a fire.

From the first cool October morning and heading to the cut site all the way up till it was lit seemed like a blur.

Trying to squeeze classes in with all the work that was needed to be done was very tough without failing.

Best four falls of my lifetime.

As a drum major, I got to help light it my senior year. I can tell you it got hot real quick.

Almost flunked out of school my fish and pisshead years working round the clock on bonfire. Never forget the Bob Wills music playing 24x7, and the bonfire coffee.

My best memories as an Ag - hands down. I'm sorry the younger Ags (including my freshman son) won't get to experience it. Unless you experienced it you will never know. I too remember it fondly behind Duncan.

Bonfire - so many stories for so many people to tell. There are life long friends I have made because of that damn thing. Putting your heart and soul into something tests your mettle and lets you know just to what extent your body and will can be pushed to. I know it helped me through med school and residency. 18 hour days of labor can build almost anybody up - it sure impacted my life to a SUPREME extent.

I am saddened that others will not be able to experience it and also benefit from that experience. Perhaps one day...

This week was the best time to be out there. It was really taking shape and the weather was cooler and you knew burn was just a week away. Every year when we get our first cool front I always think of Bonfire.

For me, the '98 Bonfire was almost a beacon of hope. I had a class that met in the top of Evans Library and I could look out on the Polo fields each morning through the early morning mist and see it getting larger and larger. I would always stop in that hallway and look at it for a few minutes even if I was late for class. When things were going really bad, it was a tangible reminder that I was getting close to completing the first semester of a difficult fish year. To see it finally burn (and continue to burn when we arrived in CS to load buses to the Sugar Bowl) was amazing.

Being a BQ underclassman, I didn't get to work on it much that year aside from Centerpole which was pretty damn wild. I remember a red/brown pot walking around spitting tobacco on people and smashing their pots with an ax handle. My buddy (a future orange pot) put a whole can of Copenhagen in his mouth and spit it in the guy's face the next time he came around. He stood there for a minute with it dripping off his nose, and then kind of smiled and moved on.

My old lady was Torch Corporal in 1999 and we went out to stack a couple of days before it collapsed to pick up ax handles to begin the arduous task of making all those torches. Too bad we never got to see that one burn.

Those of you who never experienced it will never know how much you, and A&M, lost.

My first was in '73. Would have been my kids' first in '99. Damn...

Somehow, some way it's got to come back to campus.

This is making me sad.....

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Somehow, some way it's got to come back to campus.

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Agree completely. It can be safely done.

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This is making me sad.....

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Agree completely.

I am surprise that nobody has said this about Bonfire.

The weeks of October and November brought a different feel to the campus as a whole.

The day center pole was raised and you could see it as you drove by, it immediately brought a sense of pride and togetherness on campus.
I don't know what it was, but it sort of made everybody giddy and friendlier on campus.

People would honk constantly as they drove by to the students working on the site, you could stop by any time and see people working on it, meet friends out there, bring them food beverages, etc...............just your way of saying "thank you for your hard work"...............indeed it was the glue that bonded every Ag former or current student together.
It is THE thing that made you aware of what a special place this university is/was.

People were more carring and friendlier toward each other.

I tell you one thing for sure..................the A&M vs t.u. game and the hate towards the horns is NOT the same since the year 1999.


BRING BONFIRE BACK!!

It was a big deal when center pole was raised. As a poster said above the fall semester was all about bonfire.

I knew guys who majored in bonfire in the fall, then transfered to Blinn in the spring.

It is amazing that a trajedy did not happen sooner than it did.