Starting as early as 1929, Coach William Alexander, the legendary head coach of the Yellow Jacket Football Team and NCAA Hall of Fame member, began to publicly lament the lack of spirit and regard for Tech displayed by most of the student body. Coach Alex carried fond memories of his own from his days as the ‘Captain of the Scrubs,’ when he led the Tech practice team for three years and played on the varsity team his senior year. The student body, like the rest of the nation, was suffering during the early years of the Great Depression. Optimism and enthusiasm were in very short supply during these lean years.
What Coach Alex realized was needed was a group of student leaders, organized to promote school spirit, enthusiasm for the Tech athletic teams, and Tech traditions and history among the student body. In 1930, Alexander approached Professor Fred Wenn, a great friend to the student body, about organizing and founding such a club. Wenn, for whom the present Student Center is named, agreed to take up the task. He set about creating the organization that was founded that same year as the Yellow Jacket Club. The Yellow Jacket Club was renamed in 1945 as the Ramblin’ Reck Club, as it is known today. In 1956, four years after Tech admitted its first two women students, the Reck Club became the first non-religious organization on campus to become coed by electing Paula Stevenson to the club.
In those early years, the club was responsible for the establishment and enforcement of the “RAT Rules,” the rules concerning the dress and behavior of Tech freshmen. The most famous of these RAT Rules were those concerning the wearing of the Rat Caps, a gold cap worn by freshman students from their arrival on campus to either Winter Break or until Tech beat Georgia at the Thanksgiving Day football game, whichever came first. Male freshmen failing to wear their Rat Caps were given T-Cuts, haircuts where their heads were shaved to form a T on their heads. Female transgressors had their hair ‘Ratted’ with hundreds of yellow and white ribbons. Often Ramblin’ Reck Club’s members were referred to as White Rats, alluding to their regular proximity to the Rats in assemblies and the white Rat Caps that they would wear while the Freshman wore their gold ones.
The most important part of the Club’s responsibilities came about in 1961 when Dean James Dull obtained for the Institute the 1930 Ford Model A Sport Coupe which became known as the Ramblin’ Reck. In 1967, Dull gave the symbol to the Ramblin’ Reck Club to keep for the Institute as representatives of the student body. Since that time, the physical, financial, and mechanical care and maintenance for the Ramblin’ Reck has become the sole responsibility of the Ramblin’ Reck Club, from which the Reck Driver is elected each year. Today, we take pride both in maintaining the physical integrity of the beautiful car through regular maintenance and washings, as well as in making the Reck as tangible to campus as possible. We always strive to have the Reck out on campus as often as possible, whether it is to support student organizations, to aaooooooogah at students on the way to class, to take pictures, to cheer on Georgia Tech athletics, or even to take students back home after a late night of studying.