The Most Embarrassing Team Name at the Most Embarrassing High School

One of my grandmother's ancestors was Nathaniel Hicks, who moved from England to Long Island in 1630, when New York was still a Dutch colony.  He is in no way connected to the town of Hicksville, Long Island, founded two hundred years later.

Hicks was a common English name, a shortening of "Robert" (I don't know how). It still pops up from time to time, mostly in England, as in the strongman Graham Hicks

In Colonial America, it came to mean an unlettered, uncultured, awkward country bumpkin.  But that didn't stop people all over the U.S. from naming their cities "Hicksville" (in Arkansas, Kentucky, New York, and Virginia) or "Hickman" (California, Delaware, Kentucky, Maryland, Nebraska).

There are also Hickman Counties in Kentucky and Tennessee, and a Hickman High School in Columbia, Missouri, named after Missouri politician David H. Hickman.

Hickman High students already have the "hick" stigma to live down.  But to add to their woes, they have the most embarrassing team name in the world.

 You'll never guess it.

Ready?

The fighting Kewpies.

Kewpies (baby talk for Cupid and "Cutie") are small, chubby, naked sprites, technically androgynous but usually presumed to be girls.  They first appeared in comic strips in 1909, and beginning in 1912 they were marketed as collectible bisque, celluloid, and plastic figurines.  Never children's toys, they were usually given to lovebirds along with flowers and candy.  They became the iconic carnival prize.













One can think of few more inappropriate names for a team aspiring to be seen as rough and tough.

Hickman High adopted the Kewpie name in 1927, in honor of the Kewpie Doll slogan to "keep smiling."  And it's stuck, with mascots and logos, ever since.












And on their official school cheer:

Strawberry shortcake, gooseberry pie.
V-I-C-T-O-R-Y.
Are we it? Well, I guess, yes.
Cause we're the Kewpies of H.H.S.












No Kewpies on the wrestling uniforms.  But they are expected to "keep smiling."