Yesterday's post on live animal mascots was more of an appreciation, not a comprehensive history lesson. But since one of the commenters asked: Yes, in fact, Michigan did have a live wolverine mascot, at the behest of coach and all-round pater programus Fielding Yost, who first admired Wisconsin's live badgers (a shortlived handful in their own right; they were briefly replaced by raccoons) in 1923. After a couple years of unsuccessful queries to trappers, Michigan eventually got ahold of 10 Alaskan wolverines, two of which were on hand for the Big House's dedication in 1927.

But the experiment didn't last long, for obvious reasons:

... the animals grew larger and more ferocious, and as Yost states, "It was obvious that the Michigan mascots had designs on the Michigan men toting them, and those designs were by no means friendly." Therefore, the practice of bringing wolverines into the stadium had to be discontinued after only one year.

As I said Monday: Buffaloes and tigers are one thing, but mustelids are not to be trifled with.

Chevrolet subsequently donated a live wolverine named "Intrepidus," which was kept in a cage on campus beginning in 1937. Its death marked the end of the live wolverine in Michigan -- seriously, in the entire state of Michigan: This fella, spotted in 2004, was reportedly the first wild wolverine recorded in the Wolverine State's borders -- dead, alive or skeletonized -- in 200 years. Blame global warming.

As for the alleged foamy, cartoonish variety, I couldn't find any record of a wolverine costume in the late 80s or any other time; "undignified" for a Michigan Man, you know (or something like that). Michigan fans, who no doubt find all of this pitifully redundant, are encouraged to fill in the blanks.

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Update, 3:29 p.m. ET. Joshua Hummert of the New York Public Library passes along a decade-old article celebrating the 50th anniversary of the birth of Bucky the Badger, the enduring, campy, costumed version that replaced live badgers at Wisconsin games in 1949. Therein, a World War II Navy veteran who handled the real badgers describes them as too "mean" and "antisocial" to be anywhere near a crowd: "We'd have to bring him in a cage, then put two chains on him so he wouldn't attack anybody." Sounds like an idea whose time has returned to me.