This fall, I was watching It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown with my 2-year-old when I noticed something I’d somehow missed for years. As Snoopy climbs onto his doghouse in full WWI fighter-pilot gear, Schroeder starts tapping out “It’s a Long Way to Tipperary” on his little toy piano. The tune felt instantly familiar. Not because of my limited knowledge of WWI marches, but because I found myself humming along to “Every True Son,” Mizzou’s fight song (I'm an alum), which mirrors the melody almost perfectly.
College fight songs don’t just sound like wartime marches or old folk tunes ("The Eyes of Texas" is set to "I've Been Working on the Railroad" after all), many literally borrow from them as well. Military-style music is baked into the DNA of collegiate sound. These songs were made to rally your own crowd, provoke your rival, stir fanbases and signal strength before anyone even takes the field.
Want more rivalries? Explore FanSided’s Rivalry Week Hub, our interactive deep dive into the traditions, history and moments that define college football’s fiercest matchups.
Why fight songs sound like marches
In the early 1900s, the military march was a prevalent part of America’s public musical language. Think brass bands and Fourth of July parades. Martial music prioritized troop morale, so it shouldn’t be a surprise that college bands emulated the structure. Steady rhythm, brass, marching tempo.
Michigan’s “The Victors” was one of the first college fight songs ever written, composed by then-Michigan junior music student Louis Elbel. Following the Wolverines’ 1898 win over Chicago, he wrote, “Suddenly it occurred to me that such an epic victory as ours ought to be dignified by something more elevating in music. We were all feeling that exaltation of spirit that comes only to youth in moments of conquest. That night, when I was alone, I found the strains of 'The Victors' running through my mind, and gradually the entire march took form.”
It took form in the standard construction of a military march.
The WWI origins that still echo in stadiums
Texas A&M’s fight song, the “Aggie War Hymn,” was literally written in a war zone. In 1918, James Vernon “Pinky” Wilson wrote the lyrics while serving in France during World War I. He was on guard duty along the Rhine and still thinking of his rival back home.
He took direct aim at the University of Texas with lines like “Goodbye to Texas University / So long to the orange and the white,” a jab that's core to the fight song today. The song was eventually set to music built on the military bugle call “Recall” and has since become a swaying staple of A&M games.
And wouldn't you know they're pretty petty down in Austin, too. "Texas Fight" is a literal clapback. Colonel Walter S. Hunnicutt wrote it specifically to answer Texas A&M’s yells and the Aggie War Hymn. Longhorn Band director “Blondie” Pharr penned the lyrics, even adding “Goodbye to A&M” to make the point unmistakable. And that “Taps” melody? Another nod to A&M’s military march. It’s a musical rivalry in its purest form!
The stolen tunes behind college football’s biggest anthems
Melody theft wasn't uncommon with sheet music. Bands borrowed familiar tunes because they had emotional pull. Boomer Sooner is a textbook case: The melody comes from Yale’s “Boola Boola” (and before that “La Hoola Boola”).
Wisconsin's "On, Wisconsin!" is another prime example. Composer William T. Purdy actually wrote the song for the University of Minnesota, intending to submit it for the school's fight-song contest in 1909.
Why these songs hit fans so hard
As scholar Carrie Allen Tipton writes in her book From Dixie to Rocky Top, "fight songs are the most potent and portable of these shared emblems and experiences, audible signs and symbols of college football culture.”
Fans respond intensely because it’s wired into the body. March tempos sync with footsteps, chants and clapping, all necessary for a college football Saturday experience. The brass hits, the drums, the push to stand and shout are music methods that trigger unity, identity and memory.
So even if you don’t know that “Every True Son” comes from a WWI march, when it sounds off at Faurot Field, in a 60,000-seat stadium, you feel it.
The legacy that still powers Rivalry Week
Fight songs may have roots in war-time soundtracks and borrowed folk melodies, but they’ve evolved into generational anthems. Their core function remains: instill pride, unify fans and maybe, just maybe, stir that rivalry. So next time you’re tapping along, remember: You’re not just humming a catchy chant. You’re marching.