The history of K-State purple
Purple is a color long associated with elegance, royalty, faith and individualism.
In Kansas, however, purple means one thing: Kansas State University.
K-Staters all over the world use purple in their daily lives from everyday items to
wardrobes, to occasionally even a vehicle. K-Staters have had a long affinity to the
color with more than 120 years of history with the university.
The following is an excerpt from the K-Stater magazine providing some history on our favorite color:
How purple became K-State
The process of picking purple as the college color is not well documented. The accounts
are mostly second-hand or based on the assumption that purple had already been selected.
According to the 1922 Royal Purple, a student committee met in the fall of 1896 to select a recommendation for the college
color. The yearbook identifies the committee members as Ina E. Holroyd 1897, Frank
Uhl 1896, Winifred Houghton Buck 1897 and Minnie Copeland 1898. Purple, specifically
royal purple, was chosen, “both because of the beauty of royal purple, and because
it could not be found in use in any other school.”
A report from the committee was tendered to the Kansas State Agricultural College
administration, but no action was taken.
Documents in the Morse Department of Special Collections concur with this report.
Moving forward, royal purple served as the de facto color of the college. Purple was
used in many school functions for purposes of decorating. Baseball uniforms dating
as far back as 1907 featured purple. In 1909 the college annual was titled Royal Purple and continues to this day under the same name.
Five presidents of the college would hold office before action was taken by the faculty
in 1921 to approve royal purple as the official color.
News of this decision was printed in the Oct. 12, 1921, issue of the college’s newspaper,
The Industrialist:
“Ask almost any student what the colors of the college are and he will respond, ‘purple
and white.’ Purple and white are used in the decorations for nearly all Aggie affairs
at all functions of state or otherwise. The white has insinuated itself into the company
of the purple, royal that is. The white, as far as is known, has no business mingling
with the college color at all. It is a rank outsider and guilty of impersonating a
college color. Purple as indicated in the college annual, The Royal Purple, is the one and only color that represents K.S.A.C.”
The article further indicated it was unknown as to why an official declaration to
make purple the official school color was never made and implied it was likely an
oversight.
Defining royal purple
So what is royal purple? Well, it’s been many shades and varieties. Darker purples,
lighter lavenders, Tyrian purple, mauve and other shades within this colorspace have
all been used to promote and draw connections to K-State at one time or another.
It wasn’t until 1978 that the university first attempted to define and standardize
exactly what color royal purple was.
According to a university memo, the color Pantone Matching System (PMS) 527 was adopted
by K-State to go along with the rollout of the KSU wordmark used on stationary at
that time.
“It is a royal purple which is slightly bluer than was in common use previously,”
the memo stated.
Later versions of the university’s branding included an attempt in the mid-1990s to
shift to other purples including “medium purple” (PMS 527) and “Pantone violet” (PMS
266), to set a more standard color. These shades, however, are very different; one
skews red, the other blue. Additionally, other shades were still used across the university.
For the past 12 years, K-State has made a more concerted effort to reign in the color
to a more standard purple across the university’s brand and image, setting the purple
to PMS 268. Additionally, K-State Athletics partners with Nike for its uniforms and gear. They
use a purple called "New Orchid Purple" which is very close to PMS 2695 and used by
Athletics for various materials.
No matter the shade, K-Staters wear their purple with pride! Learn more about other well-loved K-State history and traditions here.