Brother Charles Kinsky, S.M., gave the St. Mary’s athletics teams their nickname.

According to a 1926 issue of The Rattler newspaper, the basketball team “ran roughshod over everything in sight.” Many students thought the team needed a name, and they formed a spirit committee to choose a nickname for all teams.

Legend holds that the football practice field had to be cleared of diamondback rattlesnakes on a regular basis, thus leading to the designation, but this is not how we got our mascot. Brother Kinsky thought “Rattlers” would be fitting because there was already on campus a Rattler Club whose members had recently begun The Rattler newspaper. There was debate as to whether the name was being run into the ground, but the students quickly said they wanted the Rattler nickname.

Alton Seekatz (B.S.C. ’32), a member of the Rattler Club, described the organization as a spirit and social organization. “It was called the Rattler Club when I got here in 1926, and I’m not sure how it got its nickname,” he said, although his stories of the club members’ antics and efforts to raise school spirit would certainly “rattle” some and “shake” up others.

Perhaps the rattlesnakes on the football field had a role in naming the club and newspaper?