100th NIGHT SHOW

From the 10 March 1950 Pointer magazine

Every cadet counts days. It's part of the tradition of the place. Cadets have counted days ever since a guy named Jonathan Swift sat down to compute the number of days remaining before his graduation from the infant USMA. He or some other character soon hit upon the idea of leaving such figuring to the plebes, knowledge of the exact number of days prior to graduation prior to Graduation has been an integral part of the Fourth Classman's fund of knowledge of ready information. Naturally enough, with everyone thereby closely attuned at all time to the passage of time, that day when there was an even one hundred days left before the Great Event began to emerge as something of a milestone in the career of the Cadet. The day acquired added significance because it invariably occurred (days always invariably occur around here) near the end of Febuary, at the time when West Point of old began to stir beneath its blanket of snow and cast off the gloom which used to shroud the Plain during the short days of winter. Around the end of February the days have lengthened enough so that the sun appears in the fairly early morning. Back in antiquity it was discovered that on the one hundredth day before graduation the sun appeared over the eastern mountains just as the Corps marched back from breakfast. Of course a certain amount of delaying around the Mess Hall was entailed, but after a few years the boys go so that they could gauge the advent of Old Sol so that on One Hundredth Day the sun would hit them full in the face on the march home, signifying the lifting of Gloom, for the days being down to two figures, and Spring in the offing, time would pass with a minimum of pain. One Hundred Day became an event of considerable stature, a time when spirits rose, and joy reigned in the bleak barracks. That night there would be extraordinary doings in the Mess Hall. Plebes and upperclassmen would exchange prerogatives, and rankling Fourth Classmen could vent their pent up wrath on their tormentors in all the many forms of torture peculiar to the plebe system of the day. Some of the lads would get together and present skits and other entertainment for their new masters. One Hundredth Night came to be something to be looked forward to.

Back about that time there were a bunch of culture pushers in the Corps who, in the flowing manner of their times, called themselves the Philomathian Society, and later, the Amasophic Society. These organizations busied themselves priming West Point's springs of culture with lecturers, actors and performers of one sort or another. In 1824 the groups adopted the title of Dialectic Society and began to sponsor debates. This activity promptly got them disbanded when one of their debates on Slavery ended up in a not inconsiderable riot. Revived in 1845, the Dialectic Society channeled its efforts into less exciting fields. In 1846 they brought a one act play to West Point, made such a sensation that they thereafter continued the practice. (Somewhere around here they began publishing something they called the HOWITZER, which later merged with a Cornwall, New York, oil well to become the big, sprawling, colorful, economic orgy we all are familiar with today.) In 1871 the Dialectic Society decided that the priming was no longer needed and began to tap West Point culture for talent for their annual show. In that year the first all Cadet stage show was produced under its auspices. Some time after that the Dialectic Society's annual production got involved with the Hundredth Night celebration, and to this day the Hundredth Night Show out harbingers the robin around here.

Editors Note: The Hundredth Night is still celebrated today although with the admittance of female cadets, the males do not have to act the part of the opposite gender. The events in the Mess Hall are also no doubt considerably more subdued than they were in the lusty days of our predecessors.

From a '49 Grad:
On the hundredth night dinner in Washington Hall the tradition was that plebes and upperclassmen would exchange authority during that meal. The plebes would run the table and the upperclassmen would serve as Water Corporal, Gunner, etc. The goal of the upperclassmen was to make sure the plebes got very little to eat by, for instance, passing a glass of milk with their fingers in the milk up to the second knuckle. The object of the plebes was, naturally, to wreak revenge for all of the miserable meals to which they had been subjected in a one-meal orgy of sadism. As illustrative, I recall an upperclassman receiving our regular Friday night fish dish from the waiter (chunks of fish whose last swim was in some God-awful watery fishgravy) -- taking the large platter of 12 pieces of fish and gravy --announcing loudly to the upperclass-plebes.Sir, the fish are on the table and turning the platter over and dumping the whole mess on the table.I also recall a cadet captain being "ordered" to sit at the head of the table and as he seated himself a plebe slid a freshly baked pie on theseat as a resting place for his dress gray trousers. I think this tradition in my plebe year was the last year the authorities permitted these shenanigans. The reasons it was ended were the cleaning up required after the mess and also probably the utter lack of decorous behavior from "Officers and Gentlemen" being incubated by the system. The youthful highjinx were fun while they lasted.

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