“A Blue Hose is a fierce Scottish warrior. If you have ever seen the movie Braveheart, you have seen a true Blue Hose.”

Despite this depiction, it still has been asked many times where Presbyterian College received its Blue Hose nick­name.

Several rumors exist and Ray Frank in his book, “What’s In A Nick­name” delved into the subject. Frank discovered that there were many opinions. One story had it that the Presbyterian Scotch-Irish wore blue stockings in the Puritan beginnings of the United States. Another said that a fierce war-like band of Scotch-Irish named the Hose painted their entire bod­ies blue before going into battle.

Yet, probably the true story lies in a letter dated June 15, 1935, written by then PC athletic director Walter Johnson to an inquiring English professor in Virginia.

[Quoting from Walter Johnson’s letter] ‘It was about the sec­ond or third year, 1915, if I remember right, Stockings. I think it happened this way: I changed uniform colors to blue, wearing blue stockings and jerseys, and some sports writer started calling in his articles the Presbyterian College teams the Blue Stockings.’

In later years “Stocking” became ab­breviated to “the Hose,” particularly in newspaper headlines. It was more or less officially adopted by the student body in the 1950’s.

All the PC media guides since 1996 continued to elaborate on the issue, quoting an article by Ben Hay Ham­met entitled “The Spirit of PC.” The piece by Hammet articulated that, “Johnson always insisted on the fact that his players wear long blue socks similar to stockings (after all, there were White Sox and Red Sox in base­ball).

Coach Johnson’s explanation may sim­ply be coincidental to the fact that the phrase “Blue Stocking Presbyterian” goes back informally quite a few years in the denomination’s history.” Nev­ertheless, PC’s athletic nickname was shortened to Blue Hose in 1954.