Herndon Monument
The Herndon Monument is a 7 m high obelisk on the grounds of the United States Naval Academy in Annapolis , Maryland . It was erected in memory of William Lewis Herndon, the captain of Central America , who went down in a storm on the bridge of his ship in 1857.
Today the monument is best known for a spectacle that takes place every year in May, with which the recruits (called plebes ) of the academy celebrate the end of their first year of study and their promotion to midshipman . On the eve of this plebes-no-more ceremony, older fellow students, i.e. already promoted officer candidates , put a dixie cup on the obelisk (the traditional headgear of a plebes ) and smear the memorial with two hundredweight of lard . During the ceremony, the plebes then have to climb the top of the obelisk in the shortest possible time and put on the hat of a midshipman. While the 1965 class only needed around three minutes for this endeavor, the recruits only succeeded in 1995 after more than four hours.
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Coordinates: 38 ° 58'56.3 " N , 76 ° 29'9.1" W.