May 2023 • Nebraskaland 43
The university scaled back its plans, dropping everything
but the 30,000-seat stadium. As head of the university's
alumni association, a man named Harold Holtz led an
aggressive fundraising drive that used high-pressure tactics
on students, faculty, alumni and communities.
"On numerous occasions Holtz stated that none of the
students had been coerced into pledging, but the peer
pressure must have been tremendous," writes Michelle Fagan
in a 1998 issue of Nebraska History. She goes on to describe
how Holtz and his team threatened and even sued people
who didn't fulfi ll their pledges.
Was the stadium fi nished in time for the fi rst home game
of the 1923 season? Close enough. Contractors warned that
they would not be held responsible for injuries when the
university opened the partly fi nished stadium on October 13,
1923. No fans were hurt amid the scaff olding — and a few
even climbed atop the unfi nished upper balcony — but the
Oklahoma Sooners did not fare so well. The Sooners became
Memorial Stadium under construction, 1923. HISTORY NEBRASKA, RG2758-21-8
