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Web Exclusives:
Under the Ivy October
9, 2002: In my last column, I wrote about what was possibly the best — and best-known nationally — joke perpetuated at Princeton in history: the Veterans of Future Wars. But VFW was only one among many legendary Princeton pranks. For example, Joe Oznot '69 and Ephriam DiKahble '39 are much loved by their classmates — even though neither ever existed. Oznot's birth was even more elaborately plotted and executed than the VFW hoax. According to the Princeton Companion, Joseph David Oznot was the creation of six sophomore college students, four from Princeton, one from Columbia, and one from Michigan State. The Michigan State student filled out the preliminary application and provided a home address (his fraternity house). The Columbia student sat for the admission interview. Two Princeton students took his SATs (now, those were simpler times); and all six conspired to complete the final application, wherein they gave his birthday as April 1 and his father's name as William H. Oznot (W.H.O.) and occupation as private detective. Based on his talents as a classicist and pianist, as well as his SATs in the 700s, Oznot received his admission letter on April 16, 1964, and was listed with the incoming class on official admission office rosters. A few days later, the conspirators revealed their successful prank to the Associated Press, who reported it with delight. Director of Admission E. Alden Dunham took the news with good humor, reports the Companion. "We would have loved to have had him," Dunham said. DiKahble has a murkier origin. The Companion relates that he was born sometime during the Class of 1939's sophomore year, and his name appeared sporadically on chapel attendance records and in examination books. He was also, it should be noted, a photographer of some renown, as at least one of his photos appeared, duly credited, on the cover of the July 4, 1967, PAW. PAW's editors (OK,OK, me) reran the famous photo, of a woman "graduate" among a sea of men, in the July 5, 2000, issue, only to find out that like the female graduate, Ephriam DiKahble was a joke. Plenty of other hoaxes, not revolving around fictitious people. have surfaced over the years. A column from the February 23, 1941, New York Times magazine, sent by Theodore Wall *64, reports two Princeton pranks, including "the Princeton group who hired an airplane to fly above the Yale bowl [sic] during the Yale-Harvard football game. The plane towed a sign reading: 'Send your son to Princeton!'" But I got a bigger kick out of the other gag, in which a group of undergraduates mailed out official-looking bills from the University Power Plant, demanding extra payment. Concerned students tried to pay the bursar nearly $700 before the hoax was revealed. This one reminded me of a joke a group of friends played on one of their roommates in the spring of 1989. Recall a softening job market, post-1987 crash, to fully understand the victim's pain: the conspirators lifted a job offer letter from his mailbox while he was in class, steamed it open, carefully altered the salary figure to read some $10,000 less, resealed it, and casually replaced it in his box for him to find. The poor guy anguished over the reduced offer for a full day before his friends took pity on him. He made out all right in the end, though — better even, I
think, than Joe Oznot, though you could ask some of Joe's buddies
in the Class of '69. They've kept up with him at Reunions; legend
has it he's never missed one.
Jane Martin ’89 is PAW's former editor-in-chief. You can reach her at paw@princeton.edu
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