Having a seahorse mascot in a town that is nowhere near the ocean is quite odd. But there is a story behind it. Way back when Burlington High School was first built. Actually, let’s start 1000s of years ago when our school was part of the Champlain Sea. The sea dried out and when BHS was being built, the builders found seahorse fossils and since then we have been known as the seahorses.
The BHS Register was interested to see if any other schools had the seahorse mascot. Interestingly, we found a school in Florida on an island called Sanibel Island. We reached out to a contact in their technology staff, Soo Christoff, to find out more about the history behind their mascot.
“We are located on a barrier island off Ft. Myers FL and sea horses are native to this area,” Christoff said. They see seahorses a lot out on the beach and in the water. She says that the seahorse is a good representation of their fierce school spirit.
“At one time, every classroom in our school had a live fish tank with seahorses in it,” Christoff said. “Our school colors are blue and white, with the seahorse mascot being blue.”
This year they are celebrating the school’s 120th year. Along those 120 years, there have been attempts to change the mascot, the last one being in the 80s, but the students have always stayed with the seahorse as their mascot. BHS has also tried to change our mascot but clearly, it has stayed.
The Sanibel K-8 school has a statue in their main lobby of their seahorse “Seraphina.” She has appeared in students’ literature and decoration in their halls.
The Sanibel High School is on the mainland on the other side of the pond from Sanibel K-8 school. Their mascot is the Green Wave.
“I won’t go into too many details but that mascot originated from a football team’s travels by boat to a game in Tampa. Evidently, the ride was rocky and well you can fill in the details.” Christoff said, implying that the students got sea sick and threw up in the water.
