WEBVTT - How Did Spring Break Get Its Start?

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<v Speaker 1>Welcome to brain Stuff from How Stuff Works. Hey, brain Stuff,

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<v Speaker 1>Lauren vog obam Here, if you can smell the unmistakable

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<v Speaker 1>odor of stale beer and sunscreen, it must be that

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<v Speaker 1>time of year again, spring break, when hundreds of thousands

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<v Speaker 1>of American college students descend on resort towns in Florida, Mexico,

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<v Speaker 1>and the Caribbean for a week of day drinking, bass thumping,

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<v Speaker 1>foam parties, and perhaps more than a few poor decisions.

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<v Speaker 1>But how exactly did spring break become a booze fueled

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<v Speaker 1>rite of passage for American co eds? And do today's

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<v Speaker 1>college kids still get psyched about a week of sunburn,

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<v Speaker 1>hangovers and fried shrimp specials? Or have they moved on

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<v Speaker 1>to more respectable choices. Let's start with some history, ancient history.

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<v Speaker 1>It turns out you can trace the roots of spring

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<v Speaker 1>break all the way back to the ancient Greeks. Apparently

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<v Speaker 1>it could get stressful inventing democracy and Western philosophy all day,

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<v Speaker 1>so the Greeks like to blow off some steam each

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<v Speaker 1>spring with a three day awakening dedicated to Dionysus, the

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<v Speaker 1>god of wine and fertility. But the real start of

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<v Speaker 1>spring break as we know it was in the mid

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<v Speaker 1>nineteen thirties when a swimming coach from Colgate University in

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<v Speaker 1>frigid Upstate, New York decided to take his team down

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<v Speaker 1>to Florida for some early training at a brand new

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<v Speaker 1>Olympic sized pool in sunny Fort Lauderdale. The idea clicked

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<v Speaker 1>with other college swim coaches, and soon the spring training

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<v Speaker 1>migration became an annual tradition for swimmers nationwide. Since you

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<v Speaker 1>can only swim so much, though the college athletes also

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<v Speaker 1>excelled in partying, word got back to campus that Florida

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<v Speaker 1>wasn't a bad place to spend Easter break, and the

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<v Speaker 1>flow of northern college students to southern beaches started to

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<v Speaker 1>pick up through the nineteen forties and fifties. But the

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<v Speaker 1>uncontested landmark moment in spring break history was the publication

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<v Speaker 1>of a little book originally titled On Holy Spring but

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<v Speaker 1>smartly changed to Where the Boys Are in nineteen fifty eight.

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<v Speaker 1>Glendon Swarthout was an English professor at Michigan State University

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<v Speaker 1>who tagged along with his students to witness their beat

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<v Speaker 1>nick Arish Shenanigans in Fort Lauderdale. Back then, hooking up

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<v Speaker 1>was called house and Swarthout witnessed enough house playing, beach cruising,

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<v Speaker 1>and beer chugging in Fort Lauderdale to fill his breakout novel,

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<v Speaker 1>published in nineteen sixty. Mgm quickly turned Where the Boys

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<v Speaker 1>Are into a blockbuster romantic comedy that made spring Break

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<v Speaker 1>in Florida seemed like Paradise, or at least a version

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<v Speaker 1>of Paradise where you sleep twenty people to a hotel room,

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<v Speaker 1>but the cute guy has a yacht. After Where the

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<v Speaker 1>Boys Are, these spring break floodgates were officially wide open

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<v Speaker 1>seemingly overnight. The numbers of college students visiting Fort Lauderdale

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<v Speaker 1>over Easter vacation went from twenty thousand to fifty thousand,

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<v Speaker 1>and estimated three hundred and fifty thousand students mobbed Fort

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<v Speaker 1>Lauderdale during spring break. In response, the town passed tougher

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<v Speaker 1>public drinking laws, and the mayor even went on Good

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<v Speaker 1>Morning America to tell spring breakers to take their balcony diving,

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<v Speaker 1>drunk driving antics somewhere else, which they did. Other Florida

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<v Speaker 1>beaches had already begun to pick up the overflow from

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<v Speaker 1>Fort Lauderdale, including Panama City Beach and Daytona Beach. The

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<v Speaker 1>latter became the shooting location for mtvs first ever spring

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<v Speaker 1>Break special, broadcast in nine six. By the midnighteteen nineties,

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<v Speaker 1>MTVS annual Skinfest had become a cultural institution, showcasing live

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<v Speaker 1>music performances and lots of Carmen Electra and a bikini

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<v Speaker 1>from spring break destinations like Cancoon and Jamaica. Around the

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<v Speaker 1>same time, another spring break tradition was born, far from

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<v Speaker 1>the beaches of Florida or Mexico. In n three, some

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<v Speaker 1>black college students in Atlanta, Georgia organized a picnic for

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<v Speaker 1>kids who were stuck on campus over spring break. This

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<v Speaker 1>was a few years after the number one disco hit

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<v Speaker 1>left Freak and Rick james Is Super Freak was still big,

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<v Speaker 1>so the organizers decided to call their picnic gathering Freakneck.

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<v Speaker 1>What started as a small get together with burgers, hot

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<v Speaker 1>dogs and a boom box would explode over the next

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<v Speaker 1>decade into the spring break destination for black college students

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<v Speaker 1>and high school students and anyone else who felt like coming.

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<v Speaker 1>Hundreds of thousands of black co eds would cruise into

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<v Speaker 1>Atlanta for Freakneck, clogging traffic day and night for a

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<v Speaker 1>multi day street party. Freaknick cemented Atlanta as a mecca

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<v Speaker 1>of black culture, but the party fizzled out around nine

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<v Speaker 1>as the mayor cracked down hard on cruising. Gone are

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<v Speaker 1>the heydays of MTV and Freaknik. But is spring break

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<v Speaker 1>still a big deal for today's college kids. Numbers are

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<v Speaker 1>hard to come by, but as recently as Panama City

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<v Speaker 1>Beach was drawing five hundred thousand people a year to

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<v Speaker 1>its sugary white shores. Then after a particularly nasty spring

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<v Speaker 1>break in Panama City, officials voted to ban all alcohol

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<v Speaker 1>conception on the beach, which has apparently drained the life

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<v Speaker 1>out of the party. What's clear is that college students

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<v Speaker 1>today have a lot more choices for how they want

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<v Speaker 1>to spend their spring break. The beaches are definitely still popular.

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<v Speaker 1>According to a survey, fifty of college students planned to

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<v Speaker 1>go somewhere warm for spring break, but so are trips

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<v Speaker 1>that emphasized meaning over mayhem. In nine, Habitat for Humanity

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<v Speaker 1>became one of the first volunteer organizations to offer an

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<v Speaker 1>alternative spring break to college students looking to give back

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<v Speaker 1>over vacation. Since then, more than two hundred and sixty

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<v Speaker 1>thousand students have participated in Habitats Collegiate Challenge, including seven thousand,

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<v Speaker 1>according to a Habitat spokesperson. Today, there are hundreds of

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<v Speaker 1>Alternative Spring Break chapters at colleges and universities across the

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<v Speaker 1>United States. Kelly Center is a sophomore psychology major at

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<v Speaker 1>Michigan State University, where she's the education coordinator for Alternative

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<v Speaker 1>Spartan Breaks, which organizes seventeen different trips each year for

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<v Speaker 1>activities like trail construction or HIV advocacy. In an email,

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<v Speaker 1>a Center says that more than two hundred m s

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<v Speaker 1>U students sign up each year, even though they don't

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<v Speaker 1>know where they're going until they're accepted into the program.

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<v Speaker 1>For them, it's about the experience, not the destination. Today's

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<v Speaker 1>episode was written by Dave Ruse and produced by Tyler Klang.

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<v Speaker 1>For more on this and lots of other hard partying topics,

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<v Speaker 1>visit our home planet pow stuff work stock Com