I was sitting at a stoplight, dancing to the car radio when I heard the policeman behind me chirp his siren. I looked in my rearview mirror and wondered what I had done wrong. He was smiling and then he said “War Eagle” on his walkie-talkie. (I have an Auburn sticker on the back of my car.) I rolled the window down and yelled it back. It made my day!!
Kinsey

After graduating (EE’95), I took a job where I did a lot of traveling for a telecommunications vendor. I went around the United States and was in a different airport every week. The first time I went to the Northwest, I flew into Washington. I worked on a site there and went on to Seattle. While in Seattle, I was driving along a main road and noticed a car that seemed to be trying to flag me down. I was not sure but they were pointing to my car and yelling. I was in a rental so I assumed that it was a flat or I was breaking some law or I did not know what. A little apprehensive, I rolled down my windows as they pulled up next to me. Then I understood what they were yelling - “War Eagle!!” My orange AU baseball cap in the back window was a magnet to them across 3 lanes of traffic. Auburn was their adopted school since their local college did not have a football team and the state teams were not very good. We pulled over and I told them I was a graduate. We talked about “Nix to Sanders”, “Bo over the top”, and my experiences while a student. They said that they knew AU was a special place when they watched the Iron Bowl and saw the pre-game atmosphere in our stadium and in Auburn, Alabama. That was a truly unique experience. Our “family” is so special that it shows in everything we do and I imagine others are drawn to our Tigers not necessarily for football greatness as much as “the Auburn experience”….
Charles

I have been living in Virginia Beach since graduating in ’87. I have had the “AU” plates on my vehicle since Virginia added us to their list of available college vanity plates several years ago. I was driving with my wife Susan (’87 Virginia Tech) and our 8-month-old son one Sunday afternoon on our way to Home Depot. As I pulled up to the stoplight I thought the car in front of me turning right on red had pulled away. As I looked to the left and eased forward I heard a nice thump as I ran into the back of a Chevy Blazer. My wife gave me a very disgusted look as if to say, “I’m not surprised at all with the way you drive.” I backed up a few feet, got out and walked toward the front of my vehicle while at the same time the woman I hit was walking to the back of her car. Now in Virginia we are required to have front license plates as well as rear. As I approached and started examining the damage the women looked at my tag and then at me and gave me a hearty “War Eagle” as well as a “high five”. She said that her car was fine. I checked with her again to make certain and then we exchanged pleasantries quickly so we could move our cars that were blocking the street. When I got back in my car my wife had the strangest look on her face and asked, “what was that?” From her vantage point I had just rear-ended a women who gets out of her car and gives me a “high five” and I’m back in my car in less than a minute. If that had been a UA graduate I’d still be waiting on my court date. It is great to be an Auburn Tiger even in Virginia!
- Vincent