Warden: The One (and only) Live Bear Mascot
His name was “Warden” for reasons unknown.
And, contrary to some reports, Warden was not a bear cub. He was a whopping 400 pounds, and nine-feet tall when standing on his hind legs.
The first (and only) live bear mascot the university adopted arrived in 1926, just three years after the Colorado State Teachers College named a real mascot. It came, unfortunately, after a controversial statement from 1923 football coach George Cooper, who was tired of having the teams’ nicknamed “The Teachers.” Said Coach Cooper: “Teachers is an effeminate title. Now we are ‘The Bears.’”
So, after three years with the new nickname, the college acquired Warden.
He had been at Fitzsimmons Army Hospital in Denver since he was a cub, entertaining wounded war veterans. When he became full-grown, he was too large for the patients, so Fitzsimmons officials said the college could have him on the condition that he would be given to the Denver Zoo when the university could no longer keep him.
In 1926, he came to the college to boost the morale of the football players and to become involved in school rallies and parades. But there were some problems.
For one, they kept him chained up outside, behind the administration building by a playground. After only one week in Greeley, Warden escaped. The Mirror student newspaper on Oct. 28, 1926, stated the “playful” Warden escaped from his playground, and roamed some yards of homes in southeast Greeley. There were calls to police, calls to the college and, finally, some bold members of the Lambda Gamma Fraternity recaptured Warden and took him back to his playground home.
It was discovered that Warden was more trouble than the college expected, and he soon was taken to the Denver Zoo and made a permanent resident.
There is only one other record of a live mascot on campus, and that was in 1940, when the Bears took on a dog named “Elmer” as the Colorado State College of Education mascot. He too, only lasted a short time.
Since then, the mascot has consisted of a student in a Bear suit. They also came in various mascot names:
- 1930s: “Mr. Bear.”
- 1980s: “Bentley Bear.”
- 1982: “Centennial Bear,” so named for one year for the 100th anniversary of the college.
- 2002: “Gunter the Bear,” apparently named after Gunter Hall on campus.
- 2003 – “Klawz,” so named by a vote of the students. That name remains for the bear.
