University of California Button
date: label: Date made
content: ca 1974
name: label: associated institution
content: University of California, Berkeley
notes: label: Description (Brief)
content: Round collegiate button is blue with an image of a bear and the letter "C" in yellow in the center of the button representing the University of California, Berkeley. Cal's mascot is the golden bears. The school colors since 1875 have been Yale Blue and California Gold. Blue was chosen to represent the ocean along California's coast, and Yale blue was specifically chosen because several of the University's founders attended Yale University. Gold was chosen to represent the gold rush of the 1840s and 1850s that was responsible for populating the state. The use of blue and gold by the school lead to the de facto state colors of California being blue and gold from 1913-1951 with the colors becoming ofifcial state colors later that year.
label: Description (Brief)
content: The bear was selected as the university's mascot because the bear had been the symbol of California dating back to the early days of the California Republic. One of the first appearances of the bear at a Cal athletic event was when the 1895 Cal track team brought a blue banner with the outline of a gold bear to a track meet against powers such as Princeton, Yale, Pennsylvania, and Chicago. The Cal team, who was considered an underdog, triumphed at the track meet, leading them to take the banner to later meets as a good luck token. The team has also been referred to as Grizzlies, Ursae, Bruins, and Bears throughout the years, but Golden Bears has been the team's official mascot since the early 19th century.
label: Location
content: Currently not on view
topic: label: web subject
content: Sports
label: level of sport
content: collegiate
setName: label: See more items in
content: Culture and the Arts: Sport and Leisure
dataSource: label: Data Source
content: National Museum of American History
identifier: label: ID Number
content: 1982.0365.26
label: accession number
content: 1982.0365
label: catalog number
content: 1982.0365.26
objectType: label: Object Name
content: button, football
label: Object Name
content: button, collegiate
physicalDescription: label: Physical Description
content: metal (overall material)
label: Measurements
content: overall: 1 3/4 in; 4.445 cm