HOW TECH TICKS
SKIPPER
A VIRGINIA TECH TRADITION SINCE 1963
Angel Carcamo-Reyes Skipper Crew
22 | DRILLFIELD | HOW TECH TICKS
In the early 1960s, Homer “Sonny” Hickam ’64, Alton “Butch” Harper ’64, and George Fox ’64 tired of the smack talk and decided to fire back. Armed with a plan to “build the biggest cannon the world had ever seen,” the trio collected extra brass from cadets’ uniform items as well as shell casings from the firing range, which they would melt for the gun. Foundry owner Paul Huffman, an alumnus of the Corps of Cadets, cast the cannon at no charge. When the cadets learned of the assassination of President John Fitzgerald Kennedy
(JFK), this gave birth to the name Skipper, which had two meanings: first to honor JFK, as he had been a skipper in the U.S. Navy, and also as an inside joke for the cadets (Skipper was a nickname for senior cadet privates who had gotten in trouble.) At the 1963 VMI vs. Virginia Tech game, 50 cadets hauled Skipper from underneath the bleachers and fired the gun. The cannon suffered a blowout in 1982, so in 1984, Paul Huffman Jr. ’78, whose father had cast the original Skipper, offered to fabricate a new cannon at no charge. Skipper II is based on a Confederate Civil War cannon. Its design compares to a 3-inch ordnance cannon, which is 70 inches long and weighs about 800 pounds. Members of the 2021 Skipper Crew, Alex Bangardt, Ethan Boutwell, Gavin Coburn, Shane Huweart, Ricky Weikle, Angel Carcamo-Reyes, and Caleb Tuggle, contributed to this story.
MAJ. GEN. RANDAL FULLHART, CHASE MARTINEZ, CF
BEING ON SKIPPER CREW MEANS A LOT TO ME. WE WORK AS A TEAM TO GET THINGS DONE AT ANY EVENT WHERE WE NEED TO FIRE THE CANNON, AND OUR CHEMISTRY IN DOING SO IS UNMATCHED. I PERSONALLY CARE ABOUT EACH AND EVERY PERSON ON SKIPPER CREW, AND I'M SURE ANYONE ON SKIPPER CREW WOULD SAY THE SAME. THESE PEOPLE ARE LIKE FAMILY TO ME, AND I WOULDN’T TRADE IT FOR ANYTHING.”
EACH YEAR, DATING BACK TO 1918, Virginia Tech (then VPI) would meet rival Virginia Military Institute (VMI) in a football game played Thanksgiving Day. VMI had a cannon named “Little John,” which it would fire every time the Keydets scored, while their cadets chanted: “Where’s your cannon?”
