Work Em Silly Gators Sign from 97 Florida Game

I was 9 years old and in the student section for this game. Saw this happen live. It was hours before kickoffs and seemed like only 100 people were in the stadium.

How it’s described there is exactly how it happened.

So I was part of the initial duo that stole the sign. The one who did the actual grab is JPinLondon on here. We saw the sign and both of us said we had to do something about it. So we walked around the concourse from the student section undetected to get behind them without being noticed. Once we did so, he bolted down the stairs to grab the sign and yelled at me to provide cover to slow the guys down. I tried my best to block them and allow John to get back to the student section where the sign was torn to shreds. Someone got him a section of the sign later and he still has it to this day. I will try to conntact him and see if he can log on and provide his input. The rest of the day as you remember was spectacular. '
On a side note, we spent the majority of the day between the indian mounds frying gator bites and harassing all the UF fans driving by. It was an epic day.

quote:

---

the sign was torn to shreds

---

It looked like rabid lions shredding paper and throwing it in the air like confetti. I've never seen anything like it.

Thanks for the story. It's truly may favorite moment in TS outside of a win.

quote:

---

Can someone post the article here so we don't have to sign up for NYT account?

---

I have no idea how I'm able to see this ..

The idea came forth, as many of the best ones do, from the mind of a college freshman who simply loved his football team and wanted to do something fun to show it.

So Pete Calamore borrowed a bike from a friend and rode over to the Salvation Army on the edge of the University of Florida’s campus and bought a light-colored bed sheet. He used a spray can and painted “Work ‘em silly Gators” on it. He and a couple of buddies had wanted to bring a sign to the big game against Tennessee, and now that they had it, their new creation was a thing of both beauty and slight confusion.

You see, there was no comma after the word “silly.” So for a few weeks, people would read the sign and poke fun at it. Were they “silly gators”? Or gators being told to “work (opponents) silly”?

“People got a kick out of that,” Calamore says. “Sometime later that first year (we added the comma). I think before the FSU game at the end of the season.”

This was 1993. The spray-painted phrase itself was a relic of its time, inspired by the comedy act The Jerky Boys and their very New York, very tough-guy lingo.

Now, 26 years later, Calamore and his sign are still going strong. He brings it to every home Florida game — it’s gone on the road a fair amount over the years, too — and it normally gets hung up at the same spot each time, along the northeast wall of Ben Hill Griffin Stadium.

“To this day, people still dispute how long it’s been around for, and it’s past the point where I even try to make too much of a kerfuffle about it,” Calamore says. “But there are some people who will say they’ve seen it since the ‘60s.”

It almost doesn’t even matter. With all great traditions and legends, myth-making is part of the process. And so this particular sign has been part of the lore of The Swamp forever … for all intents and purposes.

“You’ll see students taking pictures with it, especially at the last game of the year,” Calamore says. “It’s a part of the stadium to them. To me, this is something fun to do.”

Calamore estimates that he’s had to remake the sign from scratch five times over the years. It’s been damaged, torn to pieces by opposing fans and even thrown in the trash at visiting stadiums.

“This was back when people didn’t like (former head coach Steve) Spurrier too much, and people hated the Gators,” he says. “That sign was a target for other fans. They didn’t like the Gators, so they’d tried to take it down or throw it away. One year, it got ripped up at LSU — that was our own fault. We went parading it around right over next to the student section before the game started, and it didn’t have a chance. Some guys snatched it and it went up into the student section and before long it was in pieces.

“You really have to watch it.”

Whenever Calamore has taken the sign to away games, he makes sure to tell stadium security what he’s doing. Some schools don’t allow opposing fans to bring signs, but some do. If security officers ask, he’ll tell them it’s used to stay warm. As long as it’s not blocking other fans’ views or an advertisement, it’s usually OK.

Part of the legend of the “Work ‘em silly, Gators!” sign is that it’s the only one allowed in The Swamp. Calamore wants to make it clear that that’s not the case. Back in the ‘90s, he remembers seeing a few other signs hung up near his, but they were taken down because they were covering up painted letters that spelled out THIS IS GATOR COUNTRY on the stadium wall. He’s seen signs with political messaging get taken down at various points over the years as well, but Calamore isn’t sure if that’s because of the content of the sign or because they, too, are covering up something on the stadium wall. But most Florida fans assume his is the only legal sign (which isn’t exactly true but certainly helps).

Calamore has missed just one home game since 1993 — though he had a friend bring the sign, so its attendance is remains perfect — and nearly missed a second to attend his brother’s wedding in 2004. It was to take place the same day as the Gators’ opener, against Middle Tennessee State, which ended up getting postponed due to Hurricane Frances.

“I was the only Gator fan that was happy that the game got postponed because I felt like I had to go to my brother’s wedding,” Calamore says, laughing. “My wife would have killed me (if we didn’t go) but my brother probably would have gotten over it.”

These days, Calamore works at the university, lives nearby and regularly takes the sign and his sons to home games. They’ll set up the sign with duct tape and then go over to a different section to sit and watch the on-field action. Sometimes, Calamore will go to games alone, and if he does, he sits near the sign; he’s got one seat in that section, too. The fans who regularly sit near it are pretty protective of it — they won’t let anyone steal it, and sometimes they’ve even questioned Calamore himself as he’s come over to take it down at the end of a game. (He reassures them that he was the one who put it up in the first place.)

One of Calamore’s favorite parts of being the sign guy is how it’s connected him to all sorts of fellow Florida fans. He’s even had kids ask him for his autograph for reasons even he can’t wrap his head around.

“It starts out as an icebreaker,” he says. “You know, there are certain people you only see at football games. Or you see someone and five years later you run into them again. The sign ends up being like a catalyst to start things off, and people will share stories about being a Gator fan and what their history is with the school.

“It’s pretty fun.”

I was also in student section when it happened.

One other detail about that story. After the sign was snatched and was starting to get ripped to shreds by the student section, the two UF dudes who brought it over were looking at an East Baton Rouge Sheriff’s Officer - almost like they expected him to do something about it. He just looked at them like “What the frick do you expect me to do about this and why would I anyway? Go away.” Eventually they did.

So many fun stories from that game.

quote:

---

I seem to recall him complaining to police and they kinda shrugged it off like you deserved it kid

---

Definitely happened. He had this attitude with it ...



Pretty sure we started chanting LSU or Tiger Bait or both. I was tripping on microdots.

I had dinner with JP in NJ 10y ago after one of these threads

Lol gator guys go to cop - and cop was like what do you want from me

I was in the student section. It was awesome.

Agree with LSUMJ that it fired up the student section.