A cheerful hullaballoo

Indeed, the eight-page program for that 1898 concert was crammed with advertisements for a wide range of beverages, including ginger ale, lager, champagne, and the “purest whisky,” as well as for MacLaren’s Imperial Cheese (“Try It! In White Opal Jars”) and “Veuve Chaffard Pure Olive Oil in Honest Bottles.”

Despite the preponderance of alcohol ads in the programs, “Pop audiences, although they go for amusement and a good time, are lovers of good music,” the Boston Globe assured its readers in 1900.

Harvard became the first college to establish its own college night at the Pops in 1896; MIT was the second, followed by Tufts and then many others. “School songs were an essential part of college nights, and both Harvard and MIT had large numbers of them compiled into song books. Tech songs included such unusual numbers as ‘The Janitors’ Union,’” BSO historian Bridget Carr wrote for a 1990s exhibit about college nights at the Pops. “‘A Stein Song,’ [whose music was] written by an MIT alum, was especially appropriate for the Pops, as it celebrated drinking and the spring season.”

PUBLIC DOMAIN

The Tech’s notice announcing the inaugural Tech Night at Pops all but proclaimed it a tradition already. “The mere mention that there is to be a ‘Tech. night’ at the well-known ‘Pop concerts’ given in Music Hall is undoubtedly sufficient to bring out a crowd of Tech. men on that occasion,” the notice read. “The Hall will be decorated with Technology colors, and numerous features dear to the heart of every Institute man will form a part of the programme. Its date, bringing it at the end of the examinations, makes it a fitting opportunity to celebrate the beginning of vacation.”

The following year, a second Technology Night at the Pop was held with another MIT acrostic program, and once again it was printed in red ink. For the third Technology Night, held the day after the 1900 graduation, the venue moved from the Music Hall (now the Orpheum Theater) to Mechanics Hall (on the site of today’s Prudential Center), and the program featured yet another red acrostic. The Boston Evening Transcript announced the event, and the Boston Globe sent a reporter. 

The fourth Tech Night took place on June 4, 1901, in the newly completed Symphony Hall, where it’s been held ever since. 

Technology Review’scontemporaneous coverage confirms that alumni quickly embraced the tradition. “Large numbers of Institute alumni and undergraduates were on hand, and made their presence known by various Tech cheers and other demonstrations,” the magazine reported in 1902. “President and Mrs. Pritchett, as always, received an enthusiastic welcome upon their entrance.” In 1903, it noted that “alumni and undergraduates were present in large numbers, and they made the hall ring with the various class yells. Indeed, there was too much enthusiasm to suit the leader of the orchestra, Adamowski.” 

Technology Night 1904 offered alumni who gathered for the first Tech Reunion an opportunity to give voice to their near-­unanimous opposition to a proposed merger with Harvard. “The expression of opinion was more vociferous and melodious than elegant when the great body of alumni roared out in chorus just what it didn’t give for Harvard,” the Boston Globe reported, referring to an antimerger song, sung to the tune of “John Brown’s Body,” with words by Gelett Burgess, Class of 1887, the famed humorist who had written the poem “The Purple Cow” in 1895.

According to the Boston Evening Transcript, the Class of ’87 sang Burgess’s words as it marched into the hall: “Everybody was singing them when the orchestra did not play, and sometimes when it did; and Conductor Adamowski finally surrendered and finished his programme by leading the song with full Symphony accompaniment.” Instead of the gimmicky acrostic program, the audience members got a libretto featuring the four-verse song “Climbin’ Up the Institute Stairs,” by Hollon C. Spaulding, Class of 1887, and a four-page additional “Program No. 6” that included many MIT-themed songs and the parenthetical note “Remember, this is not music.” 

PUBLIC DOMAIN

“Every class that ever graduated from Tech was represented by delegates assembled around the tables designated by class numerals on crèpe-paper banners of cardinal and gray,” reported the July 1904 edition of Technology Review. “Around each of these thirty-seven class banners rallied from a half-dozen to two hundred classmates, all of them bidding for the honor of making the most cheerful hullaballoo. The composite result was a great human cauldron seething for two hours and a half like a test-tube over a Bunsen burner. Such a jolly, boisterous time did each celebrant enjoy that the whole scene demonstrated college spirit which excelled any college enthusiasm on record, and from ‘stern men of science not particularly noted for any prominent fraternalism.’”

Nearly 2,000 alumni and guests attended the 1904 concert. When it ended, alumni processed noisily from Symphony Hall back to the Rogers Building, which was illuminated by a ring of red fire sticks. Giles Tainter, Class of 1887, led the crowd in a series of cheers, accompanied by some pyrotechnics. “As each president of Tech was cheered his name flashed out between the great columns in letters of incandescent fire,” as the Globe put it. After “a mighty cheer for the Institute,” each class mounted the steps to give its own favorites.

MIT MUSEUM

MIT’s Pops tradition has continued ever since, with only a few gaps. Although concerts were held in 1918 and 1919, during the war and the influenza pandemic, there is no mention of Tech Night in those programs. Tech Night, along with the rest of the season, was canceled in 2020 because of the covid-19 pandemic. The following year, MIT invited all alumni to a front-row seat as they enjoyed the first virtual Tech Night. 

A few Pops-less years notwithstanding, the BSO and MIT officially billed the 2025 performance the 127th Tech Night, so this year “officially” marks the 128th.