Blame it on school spirit and an endless roll of red and white crepe paper. That's why Cherry Ridges flunked educational psychology at the University of Utah in 1951.

With a homecoming parade deadline looming and an unfinished Utes float sitting in a campus garage, Cherry knew it wasn't time to second-guess her priorities.

There would be an "F" on her report card, but it would stand for something besides failure.

She was a "faithful fan," she would later tell her parents, who were footing the bill for her college education.

Almost 60 years later, Cherry slides into a booth at the Dodo restaurant in Sugar House, still a loyal Utah fan, with cherry-red fingernails and lipstick to match.

With the U.'s homecoming game coming up Saturday, she thought it would be a good moment to share the importance of carrying on school traditions that are sometimes overlooked in changing times.

"While many college students have fond memories of their academic experience, there are others who will get those memories from activities like homecoming and the social life on campus," she says over a Free Lunch of shrimp fettuccine and a tall glass of iced tea. "Tradition — that's what will bring a graduate back."

It could be argued that without Cherry Ridges ("some people call me a housing development," she jokes), there would be no homecoming traditions at the U. today.

When the longtime member of the Kappa Kappa Gamma sorority was hired in 1972 as the U.'s Greek adviser, homecoming was as foreign to students as afternoon tea. Formal dances? Parades? Who needed them?

Saddened that the rituals she enjoyed in the '50s had vanished in the '60s with the arrival of the hippie movement, Cherry made it her priority to bring back some school pride.

The old tradition of Greek house decorations for homecoming was revived, along with a parade down Main Street, the selection of a homecoming queen and the popular Songfest singing competition.

Although the parade was moved to the football stadium a few years later and eventually disappeared altogether, most of the ceremonies Cherry restored are still carried on by diehard Ute fans.

"Students have to work more now and they have a lot of other interests competing with their time," she says, "so I'm glad to see that homecoming has been kept alive. When I was a student, there was just nothing bigger."

Retired now for 10 years, Ridges often returns to the U. whenever she feels like she "needs a shot in the arm."

"There's nothing like the energy of a college campus," she says. "For 28 years, I had the best job in the world."

She smiles as she recalls the all-night dance-a-thons, decorating parties and bed races that she helped organize for the U.'s fraternities and sororities.

"I was the one neighbors would call at 2 in the morning about noisy parties," she says, "and I'd have to go over with the police and calm everybody down. It's a lot less rambunctious now on Greek Row than it used to be."

As an advisor, Cherry was known to don a toga now and then, and she once swallowed a live goldfish to help students raise money for charity.

"The next day, my mailman brought me a bottle of Pepto-Bismol in sympathy," she says, "but I really didn't mind. It's all part of being a true Utah fan."

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