Harvard Lampoon Castle Centennial (Poon!)

Cambridge (Harvard Square),
44 Bow Street (google maps)

I attended the centennial celebration of the Harvard Lampoon Castle, the only mock-Flemish Sphinx-shaped National Historic Landmark Building that houses (castles?) the Harvard Lampoon, the world's oldest, continuously-published humor magazine and society since 1876 [British "Punch" magazine shuttered in 1992 after a glorious run that started in 1841 and was the inspiration for his American cousin].  Written by undergraduates, it publishes an issue 5 times a year and often produces an outrageous parody of popular national magazines (Time, Playboy, Cosmo, People, Entertainment Weekly).  Alumni include William R. Hearst, Robert Benchley Sr., George Santayana, Ernest "Casey at the Bat" Thayer, Owen "The Virginian" Wister, George Plimpton, John Updike, Fred "Herman Munster" Gwynne, Atty General Elliot Richardson,  the founders of National Lampoon (Douglas C. Kenney [Animal House, Caddyshack]), and Conan O'Brien.

Although it an alumni-only event, a festive crowd of thousands lined Mt. Auburn Street and marvelled at a parade that featured a jester riding a baby Clydesdale, a Macyesque giant balloon parade, a laser lightshow provided by a Hollywood-based alumnus (who has access apparently to Livermore Laboratory's National Ignition Lab), and Japanese Drum Corps.  Later on, when paramedics had finished transporting to Mass General Hospital hundreds of onlookers who, despite warnings in drunken Japanese, gazed directly into the lasers, the remaing crowds marvelled (a second time) at alumni singing traditional drinking songs (slightly off-key) that disparage Yalies on the steps of the Castle.  The same crowd recoiled in terror as alumni started to try to hit on the more attractive ones in the crowd en masse.

(There are YouTube videos of Paris Hilton and Randy "Macho Man" Savage receiving annual awards available)

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