{"id":679822,"date":"2025-12-01T15:19:06","date_gmt":"2025-12-01T20:19:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rochester.edu\/newscenter\/?p=679822"},"modified":"2025-12-01T16:58:57","modified_gmt":"2025-12-01T21:58:57","slug":"review-fall-2025-ask-the-archivist-alma-mater-genesee-679822","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rochester.edu\/newscenter\/review-fall-2025-ask-the-archivist-alma-mater-genesee-679822\/","title":{"rendered":"Ask the archivist: What’s one question that’s stumped you?"},"content":{"rendered":"

A question for Melissa Mead, the John M. and Barbara Keil University Archivist and Rochester Collections Librarian.<\/b><\/h2>\n

In your 13 years as University archivist, what\u2019s one question that\u2019s stumped you but that you remain determined to answer?
\n<\/em>\u2014Tama Miyake Lung, editor, Rochester Review<\/i><\/p>\n

\n
\"Vintage
WELL VERSED:<\/strong> A page from a 1920s songbook with two of three verses from \u201cThe Genesee.\u201d (University Libraries\/Department of Rare Books, Special Collections, and Preservation)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

My prize for \u201cstill looking for the answer\u201d goes to the school song, \u201cThe Genesee.\u201d Why do we only sing two verses, when it was written with three? For me, determining when<\/i> we dropped the middle verse has been the first step to the why<\/i>. There are a lot of clues and some distracting anecdotes but no definitive answer yet to this admittedly low-stakes question.<\/p>\n

A 1916 article in the student newspaper, the Campus<\/i><\/a>, proclaims: \u201c\u2018The Genesee\u2019 as an Alma Mater is ideal, for it links our college to the river about which our city centers . . . its first notes are the signal for \u2018on your feet\u2019 and \u2018hats off.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

We all know the words<\/a>\u2014written in 1891 by Thomas Thackeray Swinburne (Class of 1892)\u2014with music arranged by Herve Wilkins (Class of 1866).<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Genesee\u201d was embraced by students and within a decade became our alma mater. It\u2019s the first entry in a songbook used at the Commencement Week festivities of 1893.<\/p>\n

But Swinburne kept tinkering with it: A new version appeared in the Campus<\/i> on December 14, 1898. The biggest changes were in verse three: Gone were the gathering force, the devious course, and forever loyal be, replaced by a mill-wheel, a grove, and vernal hours.<\/p>\n

Was Swinburne more focused on improving the poem (in his view) than on lyrics? The revisions confused singers: Letters in the Campus<\/i> urged upperclassmen to learn the new words so they would be in sync with the first-years. Luckily, the lyric reverted after a few years.<\/p>\n

What evidence is there for when the switch to two verses occurred? A songbook pasted in the scrapbook of Raymond Ball (Class of 1914) may be the first printed indication, although freshman handbooks continued printing three verses.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Melissa Mead delves into the puzzling history of URochester\u2019s alma mater, \u201cThe Genesee.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1292,"featured_media":679882,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[41112],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-679822","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-from-the-magazine"],"acf":{"external":"","hide_featured_image":false,"related":"show_related","style":"","content_modules":[{"acf_fc_layout":"media_text_new","anchor":"","class":"","overline":"","title":"

Online and in tune<\/h3>","content":"Melissa Mead\u2019s favorite video rendition of \u201cThe Genesee\u201d is from the virtual degree conferral hosted for the Class of 2020.","cta":"","bg":"#f4f4f4","type":"embed","image":"","embed":"https:\/\/youtu.be\/nWGfMa-R7kg","video":"","layout":"left","animation":"animation-false"},{"acf_fc_layout":"text","anchor":"","css_class":"","title":"","content":"In 1926, the annual Rochester-Hobart football match was filmed for the first time, and the marching band presented \u201cThe Genesee.\u201d The silent movie was screened in the Eastman Theatre, and as the intertitle cued \u201cAll up for Rochester\u2019s Alma Mater,\u201d the orchestra played the two-verse version, according to the College for Women\u2019s newspaper, the Cloister Window<\/a>.<\/i>\r\n\r\nLater that fall, inconsolable after the death of his sister, Swinburne died by suicide in the river he honored with his lyrics and poems. Planning for a memorial boulder at the end of the Eastman Quadrangle to honor Swinburne began in 1930 with the instruction that it bear \u201ca bronze tablet which shall incorporate two verses of the poem, \u2018The Genesee.\u2019\u201d\r\n\r\nThat leaves \u201cwhy\u201d: Stylistically, the second verse is the least focused on student-university nostalgia. Its lines frequently tripped up singers because the words were too similar to the other verses. Other possible answers present themselves, including the need for brevity and even peer pressure: Yale and Columbia also have three-verse alma maters, of which only the first and third are traditionally sung.\r\n\r\nAnd so research, like the river, continues.\r\n\r\n
\r\n\r\nThis story appears in the fall 2025 issue of <\/em>Rochester Review<\/a>, the magazine of the 糖心传媒<\/a>.<\/em>","background_color":"#ffffff","width":"width-medium"},{"acf_fc_layout":"card_grid","anchor":"","css_class":"","title":"","description":"","background_color":"#FFFFFF","width":"width-medium","columns":"1","cards":[{"card_title":"
Need history?<\/h5>","card_text":"Do you have a question about University history? Send us an email! Please put \u201cAsk the Archivist\u201d in the subject line.\r\n

Get in touch<\/p>","card_background_color":"#00205b","card_hover_color":"#283faf","card_link":{"title":"","url":"mailto:rochrev@rochester.edu","target":""},"card_hover_arrow":"","card_image":606762,"card_image_size":"image_thumbnail","card_image_placement":"image_left","card_image_hover_state":"hover_fade","card_image_link":""}]}]},"yoast_head":"\nAsk the archivist: What's one question that's stumped you?<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"糖心传媒 archivist Melissa Mead delves into the puzzling history of our alma mater, "The Genesee."\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.rochester.edu\/newscenter\/review-fall-2025-ask-the-archivist-alma-mater-genesee-679822\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Ask the archivist: What's one question 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