Doodles Weaver, aka "Professor Beatlebaum"
In my years at
Stanford, I was fascinated by the wild tales about the legendary student,
"Doodles" Weaver. My class year was 1953, and I think Doodles was class of 1941
[actually '37], at the time of the famous "Wow Boys" football team at Stanford.
Apparently, "Doodles" had been quite a cut-up, and sort of an unofficial team
mascot. He may well have been quite an inspiration to the 1940 football team,
too, because they became the undefeated Pacific Coast Conference (PCC)
champions, and went on to beat Nebraska 21-13 in the 1941 Rose Bowl.
By
the time I got to Stanford in the fall of 1949, the stories of Doodles Weaver’s
extraordinary escapades circulated wildly about the campus, and were especially
elaborated upon and repeated throughout Encina Hall, the freshmen men’s dorm. I
was impressed by these stories, and delightedly participated in retelling them.
I even came up with some additional highjinks ideas, and if I had had Doodle’s
nerve, I would have acted upon them. I often wonder how many of my ideas and
other people’s ideas by now have been retold as actual deeds attributed to
Doodles Weaver. Probably quite a few.
The following are the four most
repeated Doodles Weaver stories as best I know them:
Jesus Loves You,
But I’m His Favorite
Doodles had a beautiful framed picture of Christ
hanging on the wall above his bed. It was inscribed, "To Doodles, with all my
love, J.C."
Suicide Leap from Hoover Tower
Doodles
announced weeks ahead of time that on such and such a day, at such and such a
time, he would leap to his death off of Hoover Tower. On the appointed day, and
at the appointed time, a great crowd was assembled near the base of the tower,
but not too close to the tower, to watch. Doodles rushed up to the railing and
looked down. The crowd gasped. Then Doodles stepped back a few paces and threw a
life-sized dummy over the railing. The crowd screamed, and, "Splat," the dummy
hit the pavement. Immediately, an ambulance came, sirens blazing, and four
white-coated men scooped up the supposed body of Doodles and drove away. Then
Doodles disappeared for a few weeks, and people actually did think he was
dead.
There’s a Horse in My Room
Apparently a horse
will climb stairs, but won’t go down stairs, and can’t even be pulled down the
stairs. You can guess the rest. Encina Hall was five floors, with spiral
staircases at each of four corners, and no elevator. To add to the excitement,
Encina Hall was home to 500 freshmen men. Sure enough, some guy came home to his
room on the fifth floor to find a horse in residence. No one had to guess who
put the horse in his room. No one ever said how they got the horse out, and it’s
even painful to speculate how they might have done it.
Painting the
Cal "C" Red Just Before the Big Game
Before Doodles there was no
ingenious way to get to the huge blue "C" emblazoned on the hill above the Cal
campus in order to paint it red just before the Big Game. Many had tried in the
dead of night, only to be captured by Cal students who did bad things to them
such as shaving their heads, or dying their hair blue, or holding them in
custody and tormenting them. That is, until Doodles Weaver. Here they came in a
fire truck in broad daylight in firemen’s gear, sirens blazing, right through
the gate, right up to the "C", jumped out of the fire truck with spray paint
tanks, and quickly spray painted the "C" bright red, and then drove out of there
making a clean get-away.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
*
Epilogue:
After college, Doodles Weaver became a
professional comedian. He joined the Spike Jones Band as "Professor Beatlebaum,"
the big haired, wild haired, crazed college instructor. One of his funny bits
was to call imaginary horse races with all of the horses having humorous names.
Also, some of the funny sounds he made during pauses in the band's music were
produced by his hiccup-o-phone.
In our 1951 football season, Doodles
Weaver showed up at practice before the Big Game. In order to get us to rally
around him on the practice field, Doodles barked like a seal while slapping the
backs of his hands together. "Ark, ark, ark, ark," he bellowed. He said a lot of
funny things after that too, but I’ve never forgotten his seal act, just as I’ve
never forgotten the stories about him which are probably being repeated and
repeated on the Stanford Campus even at this very moment.
Note: Our guest author,
How Boy tackle Jim Vick, was a three-year letterman from 1950-52 and was
co-captain of the 1952 Stanford Indians along with our late great friend Al
Kirkland.
Bonus:
The
following is an e-mail I got from "Big Al" back in 2010 after I asked him for
his Doodles Weaver memories:
Jim - Winstead Weaver (apparently
nicknamed "Doodlebug" by his mother as a child) got an A.B. in Philosophy in
1937, although he regarded '35 as his "social" class. Now deceased, and
from Googling, the last part of his life was not pleasant, but while he
lived - he really lived, enjoying a varied career as a radio and television
comedian and actor. Another story was that there was an unveiling of a special
statue of the Stanfords, and when the "veil" was lifted, Doodles was sitting in
Leland's lap. I don't remember him at our practice - he probably just
performed for the Offense, as they were the stars of our group. We, the defense,
were probably off at the other end of the field, meditating.
His
brother Sylvester "Pat" Weaver was at one time head of one of the big TV
companies (NBC) and his niece- Sigourney Weaver '72, is the actress in the Alien
movies. Best, Al