In 1986, I left Arkansas and the farm and headed to Chicagoland to become a journalist. When I landed at Northwestern, I knew no one, but that changed 30 minutes after I checked into the dorm. During my first night, I met people from Japan, Croatia, Israel, India and (the weirdest dude of all) Normal, Ill.
We talked until 3 a.m. about everything imaginable. (You’re from Arkansas? Have you used a flush toilet?)
The next morning I was drunk on the experience of the night before. I had – finally – left my segregated high school behind, and I gladly entered a melting pot of cultures in a huge city. That day I had to buy my books for my first term, and I walked to the Student Book Exchange (SBX), where my joy lurched to terror when I realized the books for my first quarter cost $300.
I remember standing at the SBX with a huge lump in my throat. Would I be able to afford college? I’d never spent $300 on anything. (My first guitar was $125.) I was standing next to the sweatshirts and saw a grey Northwestern sweatshirt with purple lettering. I put my hand on it. It was nice. Nicer than anything I owned. The price? About $60.
That’s when I said, “screw it.” I grabbed the sweatshirt and checked out – $360 down the flush toilet. If I was going to crash and burn I was going to have a nice sweatshirt in the process.
I’m wearing that sweatshirt now, 32 years later. It’s a Champion. A USA-made brand I love that wears like iron. My sweatshirt has been all over the world, endured raising two children, four jobs, a graduate degree and a failed newspaper business.
This is the long way to say that I am pleased that we are now offering Lost Art Press sweatshirts from Champion. At about the same price I paid in 1986 (we are taking a slim margin on these).
You can order yours here.
I hope you will write fondly about this sweatshirt in the year 2050, perhaps while are you sitting on your zero-g toilet.
— Christopher Schwarz
The Lost Art Press zero-g toilet is definitely going on my Christmas list.
Chris:
Didn’t know you went to Northwestern. My uncle Lyndon Shanley was a professor there (Thoreau) and my cousin Shep Shanley still works in the admissions department.
Great place. I’ve visited several times.
Respectfully,
Elliott Driscoll 609 647 6779 Baltimore, MD
>
A zero g toilet seems ill-advised. I like both jumpers though. Sweatshirt has always seemed such an odd term to me.
When my wife was about ten years old, she found an old Northwestern sweatshirt on the side of the road near the stables where she was taking lessons. She washed it and wore it for the next 20 years, at which point we moved in together and I stole it. Now I wear it when doing chores outside. It’s the most comfortable item of clothing in our household. And yes, it’s a Champion.
Spooky. (And unsponsored!)
My Champion sweatshirt bears the words “Notre Dame”. 😊 I assume you will be watching the game on Saturday? Congrats on the new shirt, it looks great.
Now you just need to do a Supreme collab
Anyone else hear “In the Year 2525” after reading this?
As I understand it, Zager builds custom guitars now…
“my joy lurched to terror when I realized the books for my first quarter cost $300”
Publishing – it’s a gold mine!
Hi Chris! Just as an indication, what size of sweater do you wear?
Thanks!
I am a freak of nature. My arms are very long and I have a long torso.
I usually default to an XL so that the arms are long enough and the length of the body covers my butt crack. But I’m usually swimming in the middle. Such is my curse.
When they offer tall sizes, a large or medium tall is about right, depending on the shoulders.
Thank you!
If you buy tall sizes then why don’t you sell them? i’m not a slender reed, but to get a non-tall size that is long enough I have to get a 4x (which you also do not sell) that I could use to smuggle live turkeys out of Bulgaria (for humanitarian reasons of course..poultarian? .. tryptophanian?).
Because they aren’t available for us to buy as wholesalers.
I’m tall and skinny too. Used to get lots of extra large tents for Christmas from well meaning inlaws. Funny, I used a few of them to smuggler bulghur out of Turkey. Got caught one time with Midnight Express scenes flashing through my mind, but they just gave me a few more kilos to take with me on my flight.
Can I join in the lament about the lack of tall sizes across most clothing?
On the rare occasions when I find a shirt that is long enough, fits my shoulders, and doesn’t look like a tent-I buy several.
You should get together with Chop with Chris this weekend and make some sort of bet.
I liked the “Divided we stand” logo.
That was cool and witty.
Yes, but it became political problem….. We had people calling us right-wing nuts.
Yeah, somebody in Montana asked me about that T-shirt one time. I was a little nervous trying to explain that it was for an independent woodworking press and not anything political!
Unbelievable!!
Are these the Champion Life® Men’s Reverse Weave® Crew
Style # GF70 Y06145 (previously #GF7045) listed on the Champion website? Not to be a pain, but their website says this model is imported. Just wondering.
I still have my 1986 University of Chicago reverse weave Champion sweatshirt somewhere in my basement. Alas, mine is in much better shape that yours, as I outgrew it. Also, I quickly learned that I should not have gone to grad school just because I didn’t know what to do with my biology degree. I decided that I was not meant to get a PhD in immunology and kill mice for a living.
No. It’s the S149. There is an American flag icon next to it in our wholesale catalog. But it might be wrong…. I’ll check.
Peggy. We just received our first pieces from this run and the sweatshirt is indeed imported. Made in Honduras. It’s still very nice. But it is imported. Sigh.
Just got mine on Saturday and I love it. Hopefully the Hondurans are getting paid fairly. I was just sad it came one day too late to show it off at the Minnesota Woodworkers Guild fall seminar.
How does the blue one look with black print?
I went to college 20 years ago so can’t speak to current state of the college text book industry. But I routinely spent $200 or more on a text that the professor never used (in more than one case the prof was also the textbook author. shocking). About midway through sophomore year I learned to wait until a week before midterms before deciding if I needed the book.
I still have my Franklin & Marshall College Cross Country Champion sweatshirt from 1988. It’s held up well especially when I was working in the woodshop on cold days back at our family farm in Delaware Township, NJ.
Any chance for a full zip hoodie, Chris? I’m tired of buying junk.
When they offer a full zip hoodie though our printer, we will jump on it.
If I write about this sweatshirt fondly I’ll be 102.
So, yeah,I hope I can remember who Lost art Press was ( and my own name).
Go Cats!