Originally Posted by
abbobrom
Another College tale.
Every year the college had a Rag Week where hundreds of pounds were raised for charity. We often looked for stunts to gain publicity for the fund raising. During one brainstorming session, it was suggested that the Cherhill White horse in Wiltshire would be a good target. Myself and one of the lads who lived Nr Swindon had a midweek drive out to the Chalk horse and did a reconnoitre of the site. This included casual pacing out to get the overall size of this monster. I say monster because it can be seen for miles from the A4.
Some long nails and rubber washers were purchased, and with some help from the females at our sister college St Marys, old blackout curtains from war time, were cut into one yard widths. A free lance photographer was brought on side, and on the Saturday night three car loads of students made the trip to darkest Wiltshire in pouring rain.
We left the photographer dozing in one of the cars while we made our way across the now muddy fields to the hillside. The chalk horse was by now a slippery mess. After about two hours, our work was complete, and as dawn started to break on this wet March morning we made our way back to the parked cars. We raised the photographer from his slumber, and he set to work snapping away at the wet hillside.
We were so wet and covered in chalk that I made the lads take their trousers off before they got into my car. We stopped for petrol at a garage on the way back. In those days an attendant came out to fill your car up. A blast on the car horn woke him up in his hut, and as he started to fill us up, rubbing his eyes, he suddenly realised that there were four young men in the car with no trousers on! I can imagine him telling his drinking mates about that later in the day.
The following days National Newspapers displayed the pictures, some made the front page, displaying the new Wilshire resident. A wonderful Zebra now adorned the hillside. The nails, washers and curtains had done their job well, despite the inclement weather. We later learned that the local Bobby was tasked with the job of clearing it up. I bet he enjoyed getting his uniform cleaned.
The publicity worked and enough money was made to purchase a tractor to send to Africa.