Colleges: Florida-Georgia

Football, tailgating and cocktails

By ANTONYA ENGLISH
Published October 25, 2005

	[Getty Images]
	The parking lot outside the Gator Bowl in Jacksonville.

It's the "throw-away line" that was intended to make an impression on viewers for one morning.

Instead, it has lasted for decades.

It was Florida Times-Union columnist Bill Kastelz who coined that now-famous line describing the Florida-Georgia game as the "World's Largest Cocktail Party."

It has stuck to this day, but not by choice.

For decades, officials have tried to downplay that description, but the unofficial title has stuck for nearly 55 years.

In 2000, the then-80-year-old Kastelz told the Times-Union (for whom he worked for more than 30 years) that in the days leading up to the game he witnessed a drunken fan walk up to a policeman and offer him a drink.

"There was drinking all over the place in those days," Kastelz said. "People would use their binocular cases to put a flask in there and drink very openly and there was no crackdown."

For many, the game is a week-long affair. Fans take vacation, come to Jacksonville early and spend the week celebrating and getting ready for the game. They bring RV's and hang out.

And back in the day, they drank, drank and drank.

"It was a festive period of time," said Norm Carlson, Florida's now-retired, longtime sports information director. "And back then, the rules were lax about getting booze into the stadium."

Thus, the cocktail party.

By the mid-1980s, administrators at both schools became concerned about all the revelry, which included fighting and fans storming the field. In conjunction with City of Jacksonville officials, the schools clamped down. In 1986, they began strictly enforcing the rule banning alcohol in the stadium and prohibited fans from carrying coolers and similar containers into the stadium.

The party has settled down, but the label lives on.

- , Times staff writer

[Last modified October 25, 2005, 06:23:02]