High School Pranks: The Penis Incident

The Senior Prank is a vaunted and hallowed tradition in high schools across America. When I was in high school the pranks were not very, let’s say, subtle. They relied on brawn and criminality. Prank was just a synonym for vandalism. 

Some of the pranks I recall include: cutting down the football field goal posts, burning the high school tennis nets, burning down the kiosk in the high school courtyard, creating a playground in the high school courtyard, releasing farm animals into the high school courtyard, crazy glue in the high school door locks, stealing Bob’s Big Boy from Bob’s Big Boy, and of course the infamous car-in-the high-school-swimming-pool prank. After rereading that list, it’s no wonder our schools look like jails; heavy duty bars at every entrance. It’s not to keep the students in, it’s to keep them out.

I would also like to firmly disavow myself of participation in the above mentioned pranks. I definitely did not participate in ALL of those delinquent acts.

The pranks we played were primitive. On an evolutionary scale they were the cro magnon of high school pranks, and thankfully the prank has evolved. Last week flyers began to appear around CVHS, in classrooms, in restrooms, on walls. The flyer was printed on official CVHS letterhead and it bore the very official heading,

The flyer went on from there in a very officious and blatantly satirical manner. The author(s) have clearly read their share of bureaucratic flyers in their time at CVHS, and they perfectly captured the droning dictatorial style of high school officialdom.

My favorite passage reads as follows, “Please ensure the penises are clean and orderly. A “FAIL” WILL BE GIVEN FOR ALL SHAVEN TESTICLES.” Something about the plural of penis, just takes the absurdity to the next level.

The kid who thought this up deserves a scholarship, Harvard should be knocking on his door just to get him to write for their Lampoon. Instead my hero was given a suspension. The kids learn “A Modest Proposal” so they will recognize satire, and yet when they come up with pitch-perfect satire of their own, rather than being hoisted upon the shoulders of the masses and paraded around the campus they are punished. 

I for one salute you, anonymous young Jedi of chuckles and snorts. I can only hope you join the pantheon of infamous CVHS history and your work becomes known as, “The Penis Incident.” 

After hearing of The Penis Incident I asked the members of CVLegends to share their memories of high school pranks, below are but a few examples:

Rebecca Fain- I think Canyon once painted cougar paw prints on CVSH walls.......early 70's. They hung green wine bottles on our trees and someone put a VW on the roof!

Janine Smith- CVHS class of 1982 put an outhouse from the softball fields on the roof above 200 hall as a class gift to the class of 1983.

Elisabeth Hawkins- I don't remember all the details, but it had to do something to do with Jim wearing a gorilla mask while running naked through the cafeteria, taking the cash box, running out to the parking lot where the getaway car was supposed to be (but had left as a joke on him), and then running down Redwood Rd. toward the blvd. where he got caught. That's what I remember, but I'm not sure if that's how it went down. He wasn't doing it to steal the money. It was just a prank gone wrong. (But it was pretty funny and talked about for months afterward.) I hope someone can tell the story better than I can.

Michelle Miller Nymann- I was a senior in 1977 at MSJ in Fremont. The only prank I remember was giving the Donkeys Ex-lax before the Donkey/Teacher basketball game. Gross, I know.

 (I just want to point out the complete anarchy of what used to pass as a senior prank compared to the poetry of The Penis Incident.)

There are a huge number of memories on the prank subject, I only chose a few. Many of the memories deal with the car in the pool, which seems to have been attributed to several different graduating classes. To see all of the memories, to add your own, or to set the record straight, please join the discussion at www.facebook.com/CVLegends