By Griffin Rogers
At the beginning of the 2022 fall semester, Bellarmine students spotted an unusual figure roaming about campus.
The yellow creature seemed to resemble a large walking pineapple, and soon it found its way to campus events like Late Knight Bingo or Bellarmine Wellness’ Self-Care Challenge.
Its name couldn’t be found on any official forums, but a new name quickly spread from student to student: Penny the Pineapple.
I, like many other students, have come to accept this strange creature as a part of Bellarmine, though that does not make its presence any less mysterious.
Where did Penny come from? Was I the only one who found her existence to be strange? Why does Bellarmine now have two mascots?
My first encounter with Penny the Pineapple left me with these questions.
To figure this out, I asked a couple of students about their thoughts on the matter.
The first student I approached was Bellarmine junior Jordyn McDonnaugh.
“I have no idea where she came from,” McDonnaugh said. “My only real thought about Penny the Pineapple is that it was really sudden.”
McDonnaugh said she thinks what little fanfare accompanied Penny’s arrival further adds to the character.
“I didn’t know anyone was thinking about making a mascot of any kind other than the knight (Valor),” McDonnaugh said. "I think that because no one knows where it started, it adds to the mystery of it all.”
Though Penny’s origins may be uncertain, McDonnaugh said she still likes the idea of having Penny be involved on campus.
“I think that it’s really funny to just make our unofficial mascot involved more into Bellarmine things because I feel like you can’t really do that with the Bellarmine knight,” McDonnaugh said. “It’s too serious I feel like.”
One of the Penny meme accounts parodying an official Bellarmine post.
Photo sourced from @pennyppineapple on Instagram.
Because Penny only arrived this year, I next decided to talk to a sophomore, Megan Goosey, and ask her what she thought about the pineapple.
“I think I first learned about Penny the Pineapple earlier in the semester by seeing meme accounts of it,” Goosey said. “I don’t know where Penny the Pineapple came from. She just sort of appeared.”
Goosey said the memes about Penny are what make the character so fun.
“I think the general consensus, from what I know of, is that Penny the Pineapple is kind of a bit of a joke or just this new character,” Goosey said. “I think she’s more about being silly or goofy, which is definitely something we need in this climate.”
Another meme account depicting Penny as a sleep paralysis demon.
Photo sourced from @pennythepineappleofficial on Instagram.
Goosey said she didn’t think it was abnormal for Bellarmine to have two mascots.
“I think that it’s okay because within the Bellarmine crest, there are four different things,” Goosey said. "It’s kind of like how there’s a general school district but each school has its own mascot, so I think it’s something like that, where it’s not weird, but it still giving character.”
With this in mind, I wanted to know who was behind the idea for Penny, so I talked with Bellarmine junior Gus Buck, who performs as the Bellarmine Knights mascot, Valor.
He directed me to Student Government Association President Haley Planicka for more information.
“So, over the summer we had a leadership retreat, it was the ESL retreat, so Executive Leadership Summit,” Planicka said. “And it was late at night, it was midnight, and we were just talking about random ideas that we had for campus.”
Planicka said this is where the retreat attendees came up with the idea for Penny the Pineapple.
“I think Penny really just rose from the need to have something exciting come back to campus,” Planicka said. “Obviously we have Valor already, we have a mascot, but we just needed some kind of anti-mascot that was just gonna come in here and be chaotic and be confusing and be really weird.”
Planicka said the memes have brought Penny to life.
“You know, I think that is a huge part of it since nobody knows where she came from and we just kind of launched her on a random day,” Planicka said. “It’s like this really random creature that the meme pages have brought to life, posting things like, ‘She’s always lurking around the corner.’”
Though Penny is seen often at Bellarmine events, Planicka said that Penny’s official role and responsibilities are somewhat questionable.
“I would definitely say Penny is in the grey area,” Plaincka said. "It’s enough that the marketing team at Bellarmine has recognized Penny and uses Penny in promotional stuff, which I think is hilarious, but I don’t know if that will trickle over into things like prospective students or campus tours.”
Penny stars in this promotional video for the 2022 Exercise is Medicine® On-Campus Mascot Challenge.
Video screenshot sourced from the ACSM YouTube Channel.
Official recognition aside, Planicka said she has loved the student response to Penny.
“I mean before we knew it, Penny was at Late Knight Bingo and people were taking selfies with her,” Planicka said. “I mean Penny even has hate pages, too, which I think is maybe the funniest part, that people love her so much they hate her.”
A Bellarmine meme account parodying a “hate page” about Penny the Pineapple.
Photo sourced from @penny_h8r on Instagram.
McDonnaugh said she feels the same way about Penny.
“I feel like mascots are meant to be, like, fun and are supposed to get you amped up or involved,” McDonnaugh said. “I feel like Penny fits these criteria pretty well.”
Goosey said she would also like to see more of Penny.
“I would love to see Penny the Pineapple more involved,” Goosey said. "I think we should give Penny the Pineapple a real and honest chance.”
Planicka said she hopes the mascot will continue to be used for student activities.
“I just think it’s more of a fun, like, student-run initiative. It’s kind of like a campus-wide inside joke, and I think it’s fun to keep it like that almost,” Planicka said. “I think that’s exactly what we intended Penny to be, so that’s exactly what I could have hoped for.”
When I first learned about Penny the pineapple, I thought, “Why does Penny need to exist?”
We already had Valor and the lack of information around Penny’s introduction left me all the more perplexed as to why the character was made.
Did she just exist for Bellarmine’s Week of Welcome? Would Penny the Pineapple even be around next semester?
I thought the mascot was a half-baked idea, as though it was not completely thought out.
But after hearing the students’ reception to Penny and seeing the memes over this semester, I think maybe they’re right.
We need a mascot like Penny—a mascot that exists not for the superficial reason of advertising our school in sporting events, but one that actually appeals to Bellarmine’s student culture.
Penny’s wild and chaotic nature as well as Bellarmine having the self-awareness to lean into the jokes surrounding her is what truly makes this character fun.
We all live in troubling times and the life of a college student is inherently stressful, so the faux insanity of an anthropomorphic pineapple is a welcome break from the day-to-day grind.
As McDonnaugh said, we need more characters who will get us excited and involved on our campus.
And as Goosey said, we need more characters like Penny the Pineapple in this climate.
Therefore, I think Bellarmine should continue to embrace this character, regardless of whether Penny becomes an official mascot because I think we all need more distractions like her in our lives.
Seeing Penny’s crazy antics makes my day a little better, so why wouldn’t it do the same for other students, too?