An early symbol of Rice's athletic teams was large canvas owl, a tempting target for Rice Institute's rivals. In 1917, when students from Southwest Conference football rival Texas A&M kidnapped the owl, Rice students pooled their resources and hired a private detective to go to College Station to find the missing mascot. Upon recovering the owl, the detective sent a coded telegram to Houston that read "Sammy is fairly well and would like to see his parents at eleven o'clock," giving the mascot a name for the first time. Eventually, the canvas representation of Sammy was replaced with a live owl. During this period, handlers kept Sammy in a roost in front of Lovett College. Prior to football games, Sammy was known to fly into the stadium. Rice University later discontinued its tradition of a live owl, replacing it with a student dressed in an owl suit. As such, Sammy the Owl is an elected position of the Rice University Student Body.