After one and a half years since the disappearance of the cheeseburger bulldog outside of Hubbell Dining Hall, the statue is back on campus. The statue was repainted to represent Griff III.
According to Terry Janssen, a mechanic at Drake University, before he repaired it, the original cheeseburger bulldog went missing when a handful of students stole it and moved it to Helmick Commons. The statue was then damaged.
“I was instructed to bring it to my shop down here at facilities, where it sat for a while,” Janssen said. “Instead of throwing it away, I decided this sounds like something I would want to fix.”
Janssen added a personal touch to the updated cheeseburger Griff statue.
“My mother, who passed away a couple years ago, was in a retirement home. When she was there, the chef at the home had given her a chef’s outfit because she always liked to help outside the kitchen area with other residents, and he wanted her to help serve food at [the] Thanksgiving buffet,” Janssen said. “My mom had this chef’s coat and hat, and I remember having it after she passed.”
To honor his mother, Janssen added a chef’s hat to the statue.
“I kind of got creative with an ice cream jug, a gallon ice cream container,” Janssen said. “Kind of carved it to fit the head of the Bulldog, fiberglass it in, and epoxied it. And then I took my mom’s hat and slid over the top and realized, ‘That’s cloth, so that will get ruined quickly.’ So I soaked it in fiberglass hardener and resin and formed it, and then continued to put more coats on it.”
Multiple other bulldog statues on campus need repairs, including the one outside of Meredith Hall. The bulldog statues originally came to campus through a funding campaign in 2007.
Janssen’s fixing of the bulldogs is part of a larger campaign to bring more bulldog statues to campus.
“The University Communications and Marketing office has helped to coordinate with both sourcing the bulldogs statues and communications to promote the effort,” Jeremy Sievers, director of communications, said in an email. “I don’t know the exact dates, but I think the first ‘parade of bulldogs’ was over 15 years ago with around 11 bulldogs. Over time a few have been added to the campus collection.”
Sievers added that the bulldogs are created by a women-owned business in Chicago called Cowpainters.
For Sievers, this project is all about fun and tradition.
“I’ve personally been involved closely with ‘Champ the Bulldog’ for the Drake Relays,” Sievers said. “One of the bulldogs had sustained significant damage, and I took it home to refurbish in my garage. After some fiberglass repair, we painted ‘Champ’ the color of the Blue Oval at Drake Stadium and had every Champion sign the bulldog.”
