Snake Invasion

What is Snake Invasion?

Since the 1911 St. Pat's Celebration, just a few years after George Menefee declared St. Pat the Patron Saint of Engineers on the historic stairs of Norwood Hall, students of the Missouri University of Science and Technology have been stopping rubber snakes from invading our campus before St. Pat's just as St. Patrick stopped the invasion of the snakes (pagans) from Ireland in the 5th Century.  Since the start of the tradition, the invasion has been moved from being all over campus to two centralized pits: the big pit (by Toomey Hall, which you see above), and the small pit (by Norwood Hall).

In order to "kill" the snakes, fraternities, sororities, organizations, and communities will send their first year members who must yield a large shillelagh made from the trunks of small trees.  Female participants generally yield a walking stick, made from branches or ever smaller trees; however, they have the option to have a shillelagh if they prefer.  These first year members must hit the rubber snakes placed in front of them over and over again shouting "Here's to the First Annual Best Ever St. Pat's.  Here's to the Second Annual Best Ever St. Pat's," until they reach 109.  At that point a "pit master" will walk over to the participant and deem the snake "dead" if the participant can adequately answer a trivia question about St. Pat's at S&T or similar questions.  They are then instructed to bite the heads off their snakes and tie the bodies to the fence surrounding the pit they are in.

The snake heads are then collected by the organization and turned in on Thursday.  The more snake heads an organization turns in (per new year member), the more points they will have toward winning the St. Pat's Competition.