Has your team ever flooded their football stadium to host a mock sea battle?

In 1938, Mizzou flooded Faurot Field (it was built in a former quarry) to stage a mock Roman Legion sea battle using ships built by engineering students. Twenty-seven three quarter sized ships were built and participated in the battle.

Jiddu Aurubindi, an Indian engineering student and one of Mizzou's first "students of color", nearly died in the sea battle when his ship caught fire after a collision. He narrowly escaped total immolation after he used a replica ax to break through an interior room he was trapped in. His flaming body squirmed thru the ax hole and fell into the water. He received 3rd degree burns over more than half his body. The mock battle was temporarily halted to drag his body out of the water and resumed once he was escorted out of the stadium to the campus clinic.

My grandfather witnessed that battle. He was in high school at the time. His parents drove 2 hours from northeast Missouri to Columbia to specifically watch the event solely because he desired to attend Mizzou for engineering.

Two years later he enlisted as a Marine and spent 2 years fighting in the South Pacific, most notably Guadalcanal.

After the war he returned to Mizzou and eventually received two degrees, one in math and one in nuclear physics.

After graduation, my grandfather returned to northeast Missouri to take control of his mother and father's farm after his father was unexpectedly killed when a field horse kicked him in the chest. Eventually my grandfather expanded the family farming operation to 1,500 acres of prime crop land and hunting timber (the farm is now managed by my uncle but appreciated most by my grandfather who will be 95 two weeks from now).

I love Mizzou history.