40 Years Ago Bozeman Fraternity Serves Dubious ‘Cat Punch’

Be advised, that this article will discuss animal cruelty.

Did you ever hear the story about the fraternity in Bozeman back in the early 80s that was nearly beyond belief?

In the (what some would call "former Montana") city of Bozeman (also known as Bozangeles, Bozo, or simply Boz-don't) the University fraternity, Sigma Alpha Epsilon, decided to throw a one-of-a-kind party. A party with a frozen dead cat in their punch bowl.

The Montana State University newspaper, "The Exponent", has a detailed archived article on the incident. 

According to the article, fraternity members allegedly froze a dead cat in a block of ice and decided to serve it in their special punch during a party. They interviewed the house president, Jim Duncan, who was quoted as saying:

This conduct was the result of the act of one individual group without prior knowledge or participation of other members of the group... Exponent Archive Article, April 1983

The article interviewed another individual who chose to remain anonymous has a different detail of the incident saying in the article:

There was a sign on every door that said what kind of drink was in it. Everyone was going to every room to try the drinks.  -Exponent Archive Article, April 1983

Conflicting stories about how the cat was obtained are addressed in the article. One side of the story is that an individual of the frat found the cat in the alley, while other stories indicate the cat was killed and then frozen by an individual involved. The story goes into more gruesome details that we won't touch on here.

In Montana, we don't take animal cruelty lightly, nor, in my opinion, should any state. So was the fraternity ever punished for this act? According to a follow-up article, again from the University newspaper, they were.

In a decision reached by the national organization and University, SAE has been put on academic probation until the spring 1984 - Exponent Archive Article 1983

Not exactly a punishment to fit the crime, in my opinion. This was back in the early 80's, however, and times in Montana have definitely changed, especially in Bozeman. If this incident occurred anytime after November of 2019 it's possible it would have been treated as a federal offense.