The Story of Vinnie the Vulture
All Libraries Posted: October 30th, 2024UCF’s mascot history is rich in folklore. Long before Knightro, there were official mascots of the university, like Sir Wins-a-lot, Puff, and Mack the Knight. But before that, there were some unofficial mascots that have gained a lot of attention. The most popular would be Citronaut but right along side him was (believe it or not) an actual turkey vulture.
Vincent “Vinnie” the Vulture first came about in 1969 as an alternative to Citronaut. Citronaut, a character comprised of an orange for a body with the head of an astronaut, wasn’t as beloved by students as he is today. During that time, turkey vultures were always present on campus and would circle the newly cleared land.
Proposed by nurse Judy Hines at the campus health center and drawn by her husband, Vinnie the Vulture was conceived. Much of Vinnie’s origin story is murky. However, according to university lore, there was one vulture “Vinnie” that was particularly friendly and active on campus, having been fed by students for a period of time. The bird, and its subsequent mascot proposal, had a strong group of supporters; and students started “Vinnie the Vulture” fan clubs and dedicated creative projects to him.
The real Vinnie eventually died and a group of students had him taxidermied to preserve him in history. The taxidermy was presented to University President Charles Millican who, in turn, deemed Vincent a fantastic piece of university history and permitted him to stay on campus. He remained in Millican Hall until 2003 until placed where he currently resides here in the Special Collections & University Archives department in the John C. Hilt Library on UCF’s main campus.
Despite the “vulture-mania” spreading across campus and into the student newspaper (which reverently cited similarities between the university and the fear-striking, virtuous, clean-cut nature of vultures), Vinnie was never made an official mascot. In fact, the Citronaut vs. Vinnie conflict lasted for more than a year until students approached President Millican with a democratic solution. Out of a narrow selection, a committee of students, staff, and faculty selected the Knights of Pegasus. From there, the university has had 3 different iterations of UCF’s Knight before finally landing on Knightro in 1994.
In honor of Vinnie, we’ll be pulling more from the University Archives in the coming months as a part of our Vinnie’s Vault collection. Stay tuned!
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