Dartmouth Jack-O-Lantern

The Dartmouth Jack-O-Lantern (also known as the Jacko)^[1] is a college humor magazine, founded at Dartmouth College in 1908.

The Jacko publishes print issues approximately four times a year, as well as regularly updated online content and occasional video productions. The magazine devotes one publication cycle each year to a parody of the campus newspaper, The Dartmouth.^[1]

One of the magazine's oldest traditions is "Stockman's Dogs." In the October 1934 issue, F.C. Stockman (class of 1935) drew a single-panel cartoon of two dogs talking to each other. That same cartoon has appeared in virtually every issue published since then, always with a different caption.^[2]

The magazine is alluded to in the opening lines of F. Scott Fitzgerald's short story "The Lost Decade," which was first published in Esquire in 1939.^[3]

Jack-O-Lantern writers Nic Duquette '04 and Chris Plehal '04 invented the unofficial Dartmouth mascot Keggy the Keg in the fall of 2003.^[4] A 2006 video prank by the Jack-O-Lantern on a Dartmouth College tour group entitled "Drinkin' Time" was featured in an article by the Chronicle of Higher Education,^[5] posted by AOL on the Online Video Blog,^[6] and was mentioned by The Volokh Conspiracy.^[7] As of December 2009^[update], the video has garnered over 445,000 views on YouTube.^[8]

Notable alumni

Many celebrated writers, artists, comedians and politicians began their careers at the Jacko, including:^[9]

• Norman MacLean, whose novel A River Runs Through It, awarded a Pulitzer Prize, was made into the Robert Redford film of the same name.
• Theodor Seuss Geisel (also known as Dr. Seuss). Geisel began signing his work with his middle name so that he could continue to work on the Jack-O-Lantern after he was banned from participating in college activities for having violated Prohibition.^[10]
• Budd Schulberg, subsequently known for his 1941 novel, What Makes Sammy Run, his 1947 novel The Harder They Fall, his 1954 Academy-award-winning screenplay for On the Waterfront, and his 1957 screenplay A Face in the Crowd.
• A.J. Liebling, author of The Sweet Science, Between Meals, The Earl of Louisiana, and other classics of "New Yorker journalism."
• Bruce Ducker, author and poet, whose novels include Lead Us not into Penn Station, Mooney in Flight, and Home Pool.
• John S. Monagan, remembered, in addition to his service in the U.S. House of Representatives, for his biography of Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.^[11]
• Buck Henry, founder and frequent host on NBC's Saturday Night Live.
• Chris Miller, who based his short stories in National Lampoon on his undergraduate experiences at Dartmouth, and subsequently turned them into the movie Animal House.
• Stephen Geller, awarded a Cannes Film Festive prize for his screenplay for the film adaptation of Kurt Vonnegut's novel Slaughterhouse-Five.
• William C. Dowling, editor of Jack-O-Lantern during the period when its cartoon staff included Kirk Ditzler, James Fosso, and Robert Reich. Dowling subsequently wrote about his Jack-O-Lantern days in his memoir Confessions of a Spoilsport[1].
• Robert Reich, whose Locked in the Cabinet, a memoir of his time as Secretary of Labor in the Clinton Administration, has been described as a classic of political humor.
• William Hjortsberg, known as "Gatz", author of fiction and biography; part of the Livingston (Mont.) writing group.
• Mindy Kaling, writer and actress for The Office where she portrays the character Kelly Kapoor

References

External links

• The Dartmouth Jack-O-Lantern