A woman, who is a senior at Texas A&M, who asked that her identity be withheld, shoved a paper copy of a waiting list for SBC Cotton Bowl tickets into her mouth to secure her place in line while waiting to pull tickets for the sold-out game at about 6 a.m. Thursday.
“The piece of paper doesn’t justify a spot in line to me if no one is standing there,” she said. “If they wanted a spot, they should’ve woken up.”
The woman now known on Internet online communities as “List-Eater” was second in line at ticket window 8. She said there was no line when she arrived at the Kyle Field ticket windows at 4:30 a.m. because those camping out were still asleep. There were lists at each ticket window of those who had been camping out for tickets as early as Sunday afternoon.
Alan Cannon, associate director of media relations for the Athletic Department, said the policy of making lists of students waiting to pull tickets as they arrive and having occasional roll calls has been in place since at least 1985.
Sophomore business major Amineh Baradar said she was camping out and heard the uproar after the woman took the list.
“(The woman who took the list) walked up in the line and people were trying to explain to her that she had to put her name on the list,” Baradar said. “She didn’t want to because she said (keeping lists of who was there first) wasn’t an official University policy.”
The List-Eater said she tore the list down and was going to give it to her friend to burn, when a man behind her in line grabbed her. She then put the list in her mouth and the man who was holding her let go.
The List-Eater said the students present at the scene began harassing her after she removed the list.
“People started screaming at me, asking for the list back,” she said. “I spit it out and put it in my purse. I’m not dumb enough to swallow paper.”
Baradar said the removal of the list was unfair for those who had been waiting for a few days to get tickets.
“Its just frustrating because the list is a honor system, and for her to get in the front of the line is just not right,” she said. “Right now, it’s not University regulated because it doesn’t need to be.”
Cannon said that on Wednesday night, there were about 65 tents of students who were waiting to pull tickets for the Jan. 1 bowl game, and that most of the students waiting for tickets were able to buy them. A&M students were allotted 2,600 tickets for the game, including about 300 tickets set aside for the Aggie Band. He said the tickets sold out in less than 90 minutes.
The student List-Eater said she reported death threats to the campus police.
“My life was threatened, things were thrown at me, people were calling me every name imaginable,” she said. “They were yelling ‘Beat the hell outta’ the List-Eater.'”
Elmer Schneider, interim director of University Police Department, said the student reported the assault at about 11 a.m. Thursday.
“She reported being grabbed in the face that resulted in injuries,” he said. “We’re going to follow up and interview the witnesses.”
She said that after spitting out the list, she gave it back to someone who was trying to rewrite the list, but kept her place in line.
“There were a lot of people who weren’t on the list who were still in line,” she said. “I did something a lot of people wanted to do but didn’t have the guts to do it.”
Sophomore general studies major Kevin Moore said his friend designed maroon shirts that say “BTHO List-Eater” on the front with a picture of football Coach Dennis Franchione on the back saying “Donuts taste better than lists.” Moore said he thinks that students are showing interest in the List-Eater through commentary on the Internet because the event was rare.
“You never heard about things like this before I mean … who does that?” Moore said. “This girl’s got balls for one thing. She’s going to be ostracized for at least a month.”