Don't know if anyone saw this in today's WSJ. Just gives you an indication how much they love their football out west: A Trojan Warrior Plans His Last Ride After Many Seasons USC Football's Mr. O'Donnell To Hang Up His Armor; A Mascot Called Traveler By KATHERINE ROSMAN and JON WEINBACH Staff Reporters of THE WALL STREET JOURNAL December 28, 2005; Page A1 PASADENA, Calif. -- The 92nd Rose Bowl Game a week from today between the No. 1-ranked University of Southern California Trojans and the No. 2-ranked University of Texas Longhorns has fans excited for a number of reasons. Both teams are undefeated. The last two Heisman Trophy winners will be competing. A national championship is at stake. Stuff like that. But it will also mark the last time Chuck O'Donnell will put on his armor and helmet and mount a white horse called Traveler. Mr. O'Donnell, 40 years old, is better known as the Trojan warrior atop the USC mascot. For more than 15 years, Mr. O'Donnell has paraded around USC home football games in cardinal-and-gold regalia, riding his horse, saluting fans and spinning his sword after touchdowns. He has revved up fans and has become as familiar at USC games as the marching band. But Mr. O'Donnell says the schedule has become too punishing, with about seven home games during the regular season and various post-season appearances. "There was no Christmas, no New Year's, there was always a football game," he says. Chuck O'Donnell as a Trojan warrior atop Traveler, the mascot for USC's football team. His pending retirement will end the association his family has had with USC football for more than 40 years. It started in 1961, when a student and a school official spotted Richard Saukko, Mr. O'Donnell's stepfather, riding a white horse called Traveler at Pasadena's Rose Parade on New Year's Day. USC was looking to revive the school's dormant mascot program, and Mr. Saukko, a paint salesman and horse lover, had in Traveler the perfect performer. Traveler had been trained to buck and rear on command as a stunt double for Silver on "The Lone Ranger" TV series. USC asked Mr. Saukko to perform for one season. And, at first, he did it in the heavy armor worn by Charlton Heston in "Ben-Hur," according to the university. He soon switched to a leather outfit he made himself. The one-year deal turned into a relationship that lasted more than three decades. When Mr. Saukko quit his job selling paint in 1974, USC started paying him $50 per game, according to his widow and Mr. O'Donnell's mother, Patricia Saukko DeBernardi. That fee ultimately rose to about $300 a game. (Mr. Saukko died in 1992.) While her husband held the reins, Mrs. DeBernardi helped groom the Andalusian and Arabian horses that played the role of Traveler. (All told, there have been seven different Travelers.) To supplement the family income in the late 1990s, she tried to start a small business selling novelty items with a Traveler theme. That kicked off a dispute with USC over who owned the rights to the Traveler trademark. In 2000, USC paid her an undisclosed sum -- six figures, she says -- to settle the conflict. "All I wanted was to sell socks," she says. A spokesman for the university declined to comment. In 2002, Mrs. DeBernardi retired and the horse-training contract went to Joanne Asman, who owns the white Andalusian that currently appears as Traveler. Last fall, a USC alumnus, Bill Tilley, and his wife Nadine, set up a $2 million endowment to cover all mascot-related expenses. The fund, for instance, paid $45,000 to FedEx the horse to Miami in time for the Orange Bowl this past January. Mr. O'Donnell's first appearance on the horse came in 1979, after his stepfather was injured in a fall from Traveler No. 3. Just 13 years old at the time, Chuck O'Donnell climbed onto the horse and donned the costume and helmet, even though it was too big for him. After USC scored a touchdown, he recalls, Mr. O'Donnell and Traveler galloped around the field -- and the helmet fell off. After college, he continued to help his parents tend to the horses. When his stepfather stepped down at the age of 69 in 1988, Mr. O'Donnell, then 23, joined a team of riders who took turns as the Trojan warrior. Mr. O'Donnell has been the primary rider since 1998. In some ways, though, the role is an unlikely one for Mr. O'Donnell. He attended Santa Barbara City College and has never taken a class at USC. (Neither his stepfather nor his mother were USC graduates.) What's more, despite all the exposure to football over the years, he admits he's just an "average" fan. Before he began training a stable of 18 horses full-time in February, Mr. O'Donnell had a longtime career as a fashion stylist for the Robinsons-May department-store chain in Los Angeles. Mr. O'Donnell charges up the fans with a full-field sprint aboard Traveler before games. And the horse canters behind the end zone -- to the brassy beat of "Conquest," the school's fight song -- after the Trojans score a touchdown. Perhaps the most famous part of the routine comes at the end of the third quarter, when Mr. O'Donnell guides Traveler down the USC sideline, thrusts his sword skyward, and within seconds -- via "a magical beam of light," according to school lore -- a flame appears in the Olympic torch atop the east end of the Coliseum. "It's sort of cheesy," admits Mr. O'Donnell. The job requires a fair amount of equestrian skill. One of the biggest challenges is keeping the horse from getting spooked by 90,000 fans and the volume of the USC band, which provides the cues for most of Traveler's routine. To that end, Mr. O'Donnell or one of his aides takes the horse to band camp and team practices before each season. Like the original horse, Traveler No. 7 is comfortable in front of the camera. Before this particular horse began performing for USC in 2002, he posed in a centerfold spread of Playboy, and made a cameo on the now-defunct "Jamie Foxx" TV series. In June, he appeared on the cover of Vogue alongside the actress Salma Hayek. Now that the horse is so closely linked with the football team, Ms. Asman is choosing his gigs carefully. "Because of his image," she says. Mr. O'Donnell's job also gets tougher when USC's offense plays well -- a fact of life for the past three seasons as the Trojans have won 34 consecutive games. This past September, for example, USC scored 10 touchdowns during a 70-17 rout of the University of Arkansas. In the first quarter alone, USC scored 28 points. Translation: Four performances in about 20 minutes by Mr. O'Donnell and Traveler. The pace was so exhausting, Mr. O'Donnell says, they sat out one touchdown celebration in the second-half of the game. "The horse was OK," says Ms. Asman, "but Chuck was tired." At the Rose Bowl, the area around the sidelines is much smaller than at the Coliseum. These space constraints will reduce the role of Traveler and the Trojan warrior in Mr. O'Donnell's final game. He and the horse will greet ticket-holders outside the stadium before kickoff, but will have to spend much of the game in the tunnel underneath the stands. That doesn't really bother Mr. O'Donnell, who isn't feeling particularly sentimental about his last ride. "I don't want to be riding the horse in my 50s," says Mr. O'Donnell. "That outfit is pretty uncomfortable."
Interesting article. Most Universities that have horses (or other animals) as mascots have a waiting list and can be highly selective of the students they have work with the animals. Other than Mike the Tiger, Oklahoma State's horse, Bullet, and the ponies that pull the Sooner Schooner come to mind. But at USC, the guy riding the horse is 40 years old? :dis: I also found it interesting that even tho the horse - who it seems is privately owned - is ridden by paid riders, the pay is peanuts. Yet the school spent $45K to truck the horse to the Orange bowl and back. As someone who grew up showing horses, to me, that seems awfully excessive. Cheap bastards can't pay decently for regular appearances, but can pay big $ to FedEx to truck a horse. :dis:
If I was a USC fan, that would be a cool weekend job. I'll take the low road: They FedEx'd the horse to Miami? That must have been a pretty big box!
