University of Idaho students will celebrate the Vandal experience and rally to support the football team beginning 8 p.m. Friday near the golf course for Serpentine to begin a night of homecoming festivities.
Serpentine, a walk the campus community does yearly, will end in a gravel parking lot outside the Kibbie Dome, where a roaring bonfire will have already been lit.
At 8:30 p.m. Homecoming royalty court will be announced there, before fireworks begin illuminating the sky at 9:15 p.m. Students can then walk down to Theophilus Tower to observe a music-synced light show at 9:45 p.m.
Serpentine Chair for the Homecoming Committee and fourth-year microbiology student, Madison Dahlquist, said Serpentine will begin at Nez Pearce Drive, where students will then proceed to walk through campus and end at the Kibbie Dome.
The walk will be led by the marching band, said Mia Goodwin, homecoming advisor and student alumni program coordinator.
“It makes this electric atmosphere… it’s all about banding together, forgetting their differences and just being Vandals,” Goodwin said.
Serpentine originally started as a pajamas party in the ‘50s and ‘60s, according to the University of Idaho Traditions Keepers Book.
“Obviously, it’s pretty weird for people to run around in their PJs,” Goodwin said. “So we moved to a more modern serpentine.”
Once the students are in the Kibbie Dome’s parking lot, they gather to spectate the towering bonfire of 100 stacked wooden pallets.
The Moscow Fire Department will have at least two trucks there, Goodwin said. They will ignite the fire, watch over the safety of students and douse it a few hours later.
During the bonfire, this year’s homecoming royalty court will be announced. Goodwin said royalty isn’t a popularity contest because students are nominated by students and faculty to pick students they believe stand out both in and out of the classroom.
The “Latah Credit Union Fireworks Extravaganza!” will then begin in the midst of the bonfire.
“I love it,” Dahlquist said. “I feel like I always get caught off guard because I focus on the fire.”
After the events in the Kibbie Dome parking lot, students can watch a music synced light show at the Theophilus Tower, put on by the Association of Computing Machinery.
Friday’s homecoming event marks the last night of events before the homecoming football game against the Louisiana Lafayette Ragin’ Cajuns 2 p.m. Saturday in the Kibbie Dome.
“A lot of students don’t know (homecoming) is put on by students,” Goodwin said. “It is cool to see student collect to students and alumni across generations.”
Kyle Pfannenstiel can be reached at [email protected] or on Twitter @pfannyyy