Before branded team gear became widely available, one mark of a college athlete was their wearing pilfered athletic department gear around campus, mainly cotton T-shirts with simple athletic department verbiage stenciled on the chest. Every school had them and lost a percentage of the items to attrition each year.

Colorado head coach Dal Ward, seen in the image talking with four seniors in 1957, wears a professionally printed version of an athletic department shirt. Whoever chose the message knew little of the psychology of college athletes since it undoubtedly led to more pilfering than any other possible message.

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