I lived in Law Hall at Texas A&M.  The dorm across the courtyard was our rival.  It was another non-air-conditioned (yes, no air conditioning in Texas summers) dorm, called Puryear Hall.  The chants were “F*** You, Peryear…Eat Shit, Law.”  Or, more concisely “FUP” and “ESL”.  Yeah…if you look at my posts on the chalk drawings I did for the Children’s Museum of Houston, you will see “FUP” floating in the alphabet soup.  Puryear’s mascot was a playboy.  Yeah, Puryear Playboys.  I’m not sure how that came to be because the dorms were built in 1927.  Was the term “playboy” even around back then?

Anyway, this was a t-shirt sketch that I guess never made it.  I’m not 100% sure what it was for, but it was obviously something from Law Hall since a Law Hall “Legend” is hanging a Puryear “Playboy”.

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The men’s dorms partnered with the women’s dorms each year, and we were paired up in “Bonfire Buddies.”  I don’t remember the details of the whole thing, but this t-shirt is the result of one of those years of bonfire cut.

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I’m going to be completely honest…I have no idea what this was for.  I think this was on a t-shirt.  I’m almost certain of it, as I have a copy where I reversed the image, but I have no idea what the t-shirt was for.  I think this was the 89-91 time frame.

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Well, as embarrassing as it is, I’m going to publish this picture.  I think the year was 1986…I had to have been 14 or 15, and my dad was driving me around to the local t-shirt shops over on Gessner, and I was trying to pimp my ideas.  The little Vietnamese man over there gave me a chance and bought my drawing, and printed a dozen or so t-shirts to sell in his store.  I didn’t make big money, but I thought it was going to be my big break.

I gave him three of my ideas to choose from, and he chose “Opposites Attract.”  I bought a couple, and gave some away.  It was great driving down Gessner and seeing my work in the window of a real shop.  I don’t have the t-shirt anymore.  Yes, I know I hold on to everything…but it must have gotten lost somewhere.  But I do still have the original drawing.  Yes, I still have the original drawing from 1986.  I told you I don’t get rid of anything.

Remember, I was 14 or 15 and had just started drawing.  I know it’s bad…but it is what it is.

Here are the two designs that didn’t make the cut.  I guess there’s a reason they didn’t make it.

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Over the years, I have lost a lot of the t-shirts that I have helped create.  It’s kinda neat to see the old crap that I used to do, since I haven’t drawn anything in years.  I also think it would be cool to show all this stuff to my kids.  Anyway, if anyone has any t-shirts that feature some of my artwork, please email them to me.  I think the contact form here works, and you can attach a file.  I’ve never tried it, so I don’t really know what that form actually does, or if it does it correctly.

Some of the shirts that I can think of that I don’t currently have in the stack of shirts in my closet that my wife wishes I would throw away:

• Run for the Rainforest
• Monsters Live Here

These are the only ones I can think of, but I know there’s a lot more out there that I don’t have.

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Mike and Mike started a new student organization on the campus of both Texas A&M and the University of Texas, called V.E.T.S. (Veterans Engineering Technology Society).  They asked me to help design a logo.  It’s a breakaway from most of my previous works.  There’s not a cartoon in sight.

I have no idea if the organization still exists at either school, but the t-shirt still exists in my closet. 

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My roommate, Greg, was a Geophysics major and I guess they were really hurting for a t-shirt that year (93 or 94), so they asked me to help.  They supplied the idea, and I supplied a really shitty drawing.  I think the only thing that made this drawing worse is the way the t-shirt company used purple outlines.  I have the original drawing still, and it’s not quite as bad as this t-shirt…but it’s still pretty crappy.

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I guess this shirt is from 1992.  Keathley was the girls dorm that was partnered with Law for bonfire cut.  I don’t really remember the details of this shirt.  What I do remember is that the blonde girl with the red shirt was based on Christen.  Anyway, I never wore this one too much, so it’s still in pretty good shape.

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In response to our Ramp 9 Mules shirt, the rest of the dorm asked me to make a t-shirt design for the entire dorm.  I did two years.  This is the 90-91 year t-shirt design.

Law Hall Legends
Men Unknown
SBs Hate Us
Let’s Join a Frat!

You may notice again that the shirt shows that Law “died” in 1994.  The dorm’s last year of use was 1994, but wasn’t razed until 96 or 97.

I climbed the fence to the construction site in the middle of the night and stole a couple of bricks as souvenirs.

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I ended up rooming with a bunch of knuckleheads in a dorm called “Law Hall”.  Law no longer exists.  It was built in 1927, and when it was razed in 1996 (or 1997…I can’t remember) it still had no air conditioning.  That’s right, when I was in college in TEXAS, I had no air conditioning in my dorm room.  We just had a lot of fans and sweat a lot.

Anyway, the guys in the dorm were a great group of guys, and our section of the dorm, or ramp, had a mule for a mascot.  I don’t know where that came from, but that’s how it was.  Anyway, we banded together, came up with some cash, and had C&C Creations (affectionately known to us as CC T-Shirt Factory…Everybody Dance Now!), make us our own shirts.  It was kinda cool seeing this creation on our backs.  We definitely stood out from the rest of the dorm.

Anyway, the ramp 9 mules is what started the name “funky mule”.  I’ll post again later when I have time clarifying that in detail for those of you who have been asking me for years and years what that means.  So anyway, here’s the Ramp 9 Mules t-shirt.

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