Aggie Bonfire

The students of the Agricultural and Mechanical College of Texas, known as Aggies, burned their first bonfire on November 18, 1907, to congratulate the football team on a recent win. In 1935, a farmer reported that students carried off his entire barn as fuel for Bonfire. To prevent future incidents, the university made Bonfire a school-sanctioned event. The following year, for the first time, the school provided axes, saws, and trucks for the students and pointed them toward a grove of dead trees on the edge of town. In 1956, there was an unsuccessful attempt to plant explosives at the Bonfire site, and, in the late 1970s, a College Station police officer was fired after trying to ignite the bonfire several days ahead of schedule. Students spotted the officer before he could succeed and chased him across campus. In 1999, a Longhorn fan hired someone to build a six-foot model airplane designed to carry a bomb into the wood stack to ignite it prematurely. "He was actually in the process of building that plane when they had the tragedy at bonfire", Mel Stekoll said. "At that point, we scrapped the plan. It would have been the next year that we planned to try it." ==Organizational change and expansion==

In 1965, membership in the Corps of Cadets became voluntary for students at Texas A&M. Before, Corps leaders directed construction of Bonfire. However, because the Corps had no authority over the "non-regs", or civilian students, a separate Bonfire leadership structure was instituted. The new leaders were designated with colored hard hats, or pots, with the overall leaders known as redpots. In the following years the structure became more elaborate, and in 1967 the flames could be seen away. In 1969, the stack of logs set the world record for the height of a bonfire at tall. Out of concern for the safety of participants and the community, the university limited the size to tall and in diameter. As an added precaution, nearby campus buildings were equipped with rooftop sprinkler systems. Despite the new height restrictions, in the 1970s, the Guinness Book of Records listed Aggie Bonfire as the largest bonfire in the world. ==Design change==

In 1978, Bonfire shifted from its previous teepee design to a wedding cake style, in which upper stacks of logs were wedged on top of lower stacks. The structure was built around a fortified center pole, made from two telephone poles spliced together by cutting matching notches, approximately long, and with of glue. Four steel plates were bolted to the two poles, and a cable wrapped around the joint and secured to the pole with steel staples. Four perimeter poles were placed away and ropes were stretched between the perimeter poles to center poles and tension placed on them to hold the center pole together. After the center pole was erected, logs were placed vertically around it in a multi-tiered wedding cake design composed of thousands of logs. Although between two and five thousand students participated in the construction of Bonfire each year, most worked only part-time, and many worked only one or two shifts. Student workers were organized by dormitories or Corps units, with a separate off-campus student team. Many former students participated with teams they belonged to as students. Each team had assigned shifts, although individuals were not limited to working only the assigned shifts. Students working on Bonfire wore "grodes"—old T-shirts, jeans, and boots. By tradition, grodes were either not washed until after Bonfire burned or not washed at all. In 1983, the city of College Station began manufacturing Austin city limits signs for students to place at the summit of the Bonfire so that students would stop stealing signs from Austin. The Fightin' Texas Aggie Band began building the outhouse, ending the tradition of stealing Bonfire's components. ==Controversy==

Although women were allowed to serve coffee and provide first aid in the late 1960s, in 1974 they were officially banned from both Cut and Stack. The ban was partially rescinded in 1979, when women were again allowed to participate in Cut, and completely rescinded in 1981. Few women participated in the early years, as female volunteers were subject to verbal abuse from their male counterparts. Injuries plagued the construction process. In 1981, student Wiley Keith Jopling died after being run over by a tractor at the Cut site. The 1980s also saw increased alcohol consumption during the Bonfire ceremony. In 1988, police issued 140 Minor in Possession (of alcohol) citations and arrested six people. The following year, the local police department brought a paddywagon to the site for the first time, as they anticipated mass arrests for alcohol violations. As many as 150 police officers were on duty during the Bonfire burning from the Texas A&M and College Station police departments and the Texas Alcoholic Beverage Commission. In 1989, the Campus Ministry Association, representing 17 religious denominations, unanimously approved a resolution asking the university to change Bonfire because of concerns about safety, participant academic performance, humanitarian considerations, and the environment. Shortly afterwards, the Faculty Senate's Committee of the Whole approved a resolution asking for a panel to explore alternatives to Bonfire. Although students protested Bonfire's environmental impact since 1970, no changes were made for decades. In 1990, student Scott Hantman asked the Bonfire leadership to help him address the problem. The group solicited volunteers, and in the spring of 1991, they planted 400 trees. The tradition, Aggie Replant, has been repeated annually. The Replant organization became independent of Bonfire in 1994 when it gained its own Student Government Committee. ==Later years==

After being held at the Duncan Intramural Fields on the south side of A&M's campus for 27 years, in 1992, Bonfire was relocated to the Polo Fields on the northeast corner of campus. This more isolated site, with a larger area for people to gather, made it a safer location. Nine tractors, two bulldozers, and two forklifts dismantled the stack on October 26, 1994 (three weeks earlier than usual; the Aggies' game vs. Texas was moved from Thanksgiving weekend to the first weekend of November due to the NCAA's ban against Texas A&M from appearing on television that season), which, at 70% completed, stood tall and wide. Students and alumni flocked to the Polo Fields, working around the clock, to rebuild the Bonfire in time for the game. It was completed only hours before it was scheduled to burn. After the 1994 Bonfire was burned, two tons of lime were spread on the Polo Fields to stabilize the ground. This layer hardened to a consistency similar to concrete. In 1996 a student, Greg White, died in a car accident on his way home from Cut. The student and several companions were riding in the bed of a pickup truck when the driver lost control and the truck rolled. Nine other students were injured. In its later years, students building Bonfire used logs donated by local landowners who wanted their land cleared for construction or farming. Over 8000 logs were used each year in the late 1990s, taking about 5000 students a combined 125,000 man-hours to construct. After being doused in 700 lb (318 kg) of jet fuel, applied by staff members at A&M's Fire Training School, the Redpots and Yell Leaders then lit the stack with torches the night before the annual football game against the University of Texas when at home and two nights before the game when it was played in Austin. This event was popular among current and former students and people traveled from all over the state and the nation to observe the burning of Bonfire. Hotel rooms within of College Station were booked weeks or months in advance of the date Bonfire burned. Crowds ranged from 30,000 to 70,000 people, depending on the weather and the strength of the Aggie football team. The 1998 Bonfire was broadcast live on Fox Sports Southwest. ==1999 collapse==

At approximately 2:42 a.m. on November 18, 1999, the 59-foot-high stack, consisting of about 5000 logs, collapsed during construction. In addition to the mutual aid received from the College Station and Bryan, Texas EMS, Fire, and Police Departments, members of Texas Task Force 1, the state's elite emergency response team, arrived to assist the rescue efforts. ==Bonfire Memorial==

A memorial was constructed on the university polo fields, the site of the accident. Construction began in October 2003 and was completed by November 2004. On November 18, 2004, five years following the incident, the Bonfire Memorial was officially dedicated. The memorial is composed of three design elements: • Tradition Plaza – Marks the entrance to the memorial and reflects on Aggie traditions. • History Walk – Consists of 89 stones representing the 89 previous years of Bonfire. A gap in the timeline signifies the 1963 Bonfire, which did not burn due to the John F. Kennedy assassination. The three previous Bonfire-related deaths are also memorialized on this timeline. • Spirit Ring – The ring surrounds the site of the collapse and represents the spirit that brought the students together. Twelve portals are placed around the ring, oriented toward each student's hometown. Twenty-seven stones complete the ring, representing the 27 students injured in the collapse. The memorial design has been recognized by several organizations as an outstanding architectural design and masonry accomplishment. The American Institute of Architects, San Antonio Chapter, recognized the memorial as a winner of the 2005 AIA San Antonio Design Award. The memorial also was recognized as a winner of the 2005 MCAA International Excellence in Masonry Awards. To further honor the victims, in 2000, the Aggie Replant Committee planted 12 live oak trees at the Polo Grounds. ==Student Bonfire==

Shortly after the university officially cancelled Bonfire, students began planning an unofficial bonfire for November 2002. Known as the "Unity Project", it became the first unofficial Bonfire since the 1930s. This fire consisted of three piles of wood, with the center stack being high. In July 2025, Student Bonfire leadership and members responded to the Kerr County floods. On October 9, 2025, the College Station City Council declared the same date to be "Bonfire Day," to recognize the group's efforts in Kerr County. ==References==