Jack the Bulldog is the official mascot of the Georgetown University Hoyas athletic teams. The school has employed at least nine live Bulldogs as mascots, and counts seven named Jack since 1962, when the name first came into use, including three who are still living. The current incarnation of Jack, who will be taking over from his predecessor during the spring 2024 semester, is an English Bulldog born in 2023 whose full name is Serchell's John P. Carroll. Recent bulldogs have come from the Georgetown alumni family of Janice and Marcus Hochstetler. Jack was not always the name of the Georgetown Hoyas' mascot, nor was the mascot always a bulldog, as other types of dogs, particularly bull terriers, were associated with the sports teams before 1962. In 2009, the American Kennel Club ranked Jack as the 8th most popular dog in American culture. Today, Georgetown is among thirty-nine American universities to use a bulldog as their mascot, with Georgia, Butler, Mississippi State, Yale, and James Madison being the only others with a live bulldog. Jack is also portrayed by a costumed character Bulldog mascot, a tradition dating to 1977. In 2019, a campus editorial called for replacing the bulldog with a rescue dog, in part because of the health problems and short lifespans that many bulldogs face.
Early dogs Dogs have been associated with the school's sports teams on an unofficial basis since the late nineteenth century. Early dog mascots may have included a mutt called Hoya around 1900, a Borzoi named Richmond Jack in 1906, a bulldog named Hoya in 1907, and a Boston Bull Terrier in 1911. At that time, most mascots were primarily associated with the school's football team, and were cared for by students or individual sports teams, rather than the administration.
Sergeant Stubby, a part bull terrier and a decorated World War I war dog, came to campus in 1921 with J. Robert Conroy who was attending Georgetown Law at the time. The school football team used Stubby as a popular halftime show where he would push a football across the field, which established him as a campus celebrity. After Stubby died in 1926, the team then chose a female bull terrier named Jazz Bo, who had been brought to campus by Georgetown College student Paul Van Laanen. Jazz Bo was retitled "Hoya" by the students, after the traditional "Hoya Saxa" school cheer. The athletic teams are possibly named, in turn, for this dog. When "Hoya" gave birth to a daughter, students named the puppy "Saxa". Other bull terriers like Saxa filled in as mascot until World War II, when athletics at the school paused during the war. After the war, a series of Great Danes, named Bo, Butch, and Hobo, served as mascot. William Peter Blatty, author of The Exorcist, was one of the students to care for Butch. During this time period mascot abductions by rival schools became a common threat to the animal's safety. A bull terrier costume was also briefly used by the school, but in 1951, the school suspended the football program as part of a larger backlash against university sports. This left the school without a mascot.
Royal Jacket
In 1962, with the resumption of football, students Stan Samorajczyk and John Feldmann, editors of The Hoya campus newspaper, founded a committee to raise money for the purchase of a new mascot dog in time for the first new games in 1964. This committee chose a purebred English Bulldog as the dog which would represent Georgetown students because of their "tenacity." Samorajczyk also followed the sports team jerseys, which may have previously had an image of a bulldog on them. Around this time the school also adopted as the official logo of the athletics program a new drawing in blue and gray school colors of the bulldog. This logo dog wears a cap typical of the beanie which other freshman at the time had to wear. For $150 the committee bought a two-year-old blue-ribbon-champion show dog named "Lil-Nan's Royal Jacket," named because the colors of his coat looked like a jacket. This dog was to be renamed "Hoya" like his 1926 predecessor, but refused to respond to any name other than his call name "Jack." Jack lived outside New South Hall in a heated doghouse. In 1967, Royal Jacket retired and was replaced by a second bulldog who continued under the simple name "Jack." In 1977, as the basketball program gained popularity, the costumed mascot took over duties as Jack. The costume, first worn by student Pat Sheehan, has been updated numerous times, most recently in 2013. Other live bulldogs owned by students at times joined the costumed Jack, including one named Rocky from 1982 to 1985 and one named Daisy in 1997.
John P. Carroll In 1998, Michael Boyle, Austin Martin, and Kathleen Long, co-founders of the Hoya Blue fan club began a campaign to revive the tradition of an official live mascot with the assistance of English professor Father Scott R. Pilarz, S.J. The "Bring Back Jack" Campaign initially sought to find a suitable dog among the students and faculty, as the university did not want to use school funds for the purchase. Ultimately, Hoya Blue raised $1,500 to purchase a new puppy named Jack (officially, John P. Carroll) and placed him in the care of Father Pilarz on February 16, 1999. However, after four years, Jack left Georgetown with Pilarz, who was named president of the University of Scranton in Pennsylvania in 2003, and then president of Marquette University in 2011. John P. Carroll died on September 16, 2011, at the home of Pilarz's parents in Voorhees Township, New Jersey, at the age of 12. Donations from Hoya Blue, the Hoya Hoop Club, the Office of the President, and alumni allowed for the purchase of the third incarnation of Jack (born 2003).
John S. Carroll
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