"Touchdown Jesus" — the mural's nickname, its stones, and its view

The mural unveiled 7 May 1964 · The nickname the students', on the university's own telling

The claims. Three claims travel with Millard Sheets's Word of Life mural on the Memorial Library: that its Christ, arms raised above the stadium's end, was nicknamed "Touchdown Jesus" from the beginning; that the mural is made of a stated number of pieces of granite; and that the figure watches over the field — visible, whole, from inside the stadium, as it was when the library rose.

The record. The university's own facilities account gives the mural's dedication at the library's opening, 7 May 1964, and the nickname's origin plainly: "the students (and soon just about everyone else) began to call it" Touchdown Jesus — a student coinage on the university's telling, not a designer's intention. The same account gives the mural's measure: 134 feet high and 68 feet wide, 324 panels, 6,700 separate pieces of granite, of 81 stone types from 16 countries. The university's own alumni tour page gives a different count: "more than 5,700 multi-colored pieces of granite." The two numbers are both the university's, and they do not agree; neither is picked over the other here. The view claim has a dated history: the original stadium framed the whole mural beyond its end, and when expansion was planned in the 1990s the fans' protest ran precisely on the ground that the new seats would block it. The expansion was built — capacity from 59,075 to 80,795, rededicated 6 September 1997 against Georgia Tech — and the mural from the field has been partly obscured since: the raised arms and the upper figure remain in view; the whole no longer is.

What the record leaves. The nickname claim is supported on the university's own account of its origin. The piece count is in genuine conflict inside the university's own publications — 6,700 in its facilities account, more than 5,700 on its alumni tour page — and prints as a conflict, the university against itself. The stadium-view claim is partly supported and time-bound: whole from 1964 to 1997, partial since the expansion the fans warned against. The mural stands in the unincorporated Notre Dame CDP, and its claims are gathered here because their circulation is the city's — the boundary is printed in the Famous Locations file and stands.

Sources

1. University of Notre Dame, Facilities Design & Operations account of the Hesburgh Library mural (published 6 June 2011) — dedication 7 May 1964; the students' coinage of "Touchdown Jesus"; 6,700 pieces of granite, 324 panels, 134 by 68 feet, 81 stone types from 16 countries.
2. University of Notre Dame alumni tour page — "more than 5,700 multi-colored pieces of granite."
3. The stadium expansion record — the fans' pre-expansion protest on the view; capacity 59,075 to 80,795; rededication 6 September 1997; the mural partly obscured from the field since.
4. The Famous Locations file in this record — the mural and the stadium at full location depth; the Notre Dame CDP boundary.