Fifty years ago, she was the first Homecoming Queen crowned in Commonwealth Stadium 

By Sally Scherer

The University of Kentucky’s football stadium is celebrating its 50^th anniversary this year. It was known as Commonwealth Stadium when it opened in 1973. She remembers the new stadium being so big and so modern. He remembers how massive it felt and how clean the bathrooms were.

“You have to understand, at Stoll Field the men’s restroom was big troughs,” he said.

It was November 3, 1973. The University of Kentucky Wildcats were playing their first Homecoming game in the state-of-the-art Commonwealth Stadium. The Cats played Tulane. And won.

Carol Elam, the Homecoming Queen that year, remembers it well. So does her escort, Alan Stein.

Elam was a senior and the first person to be crowned Homecoming Queen in the new, big, beautiful, modern and oh, so clean stadium. 

“I made my skirt,” she remembered. It was a maxi-length rust and blue plaid wool skirt. Her roommate loaned her a turtleneck to wear with it. A navy-blue velvet jacket completed the ensemble. Oh, and she wore a fall in her hair to make her hair look fuller. Her Delta Delta Delta sisters helped her get ready.

“It was just perfect,” said Elam ’74 AS, ’79 AS ’90 ED. “My parents and brother came from Ashland. Alan had my arm and when we turned to exit, I could see them all in the stands.”

Stein was president of the Student Center Board, the student-run organization that sponsored homecoming. Elam assumed her sweetheart, Frank Hollan, a member of Delta Tau Delta, would escort her. But the night before the ceremony when she mentioned to Frank how excited she was that he was escorting her on the field, he told her that he wouldn’t be. But Alan would. She knew that meant she had won.

“Everybody knew Alan,” she said. “If it couldn’t be Frank, I was so glad it was Alan.”

University of Kentucky President Otis Singletary crowned Elam although without a crown. Instead, she received a dozen red roses and a silver-plate bowl she still has today. 

“It was the first time I’d ever met Dr. Singletary,” she recalls.

Stein remembers escorting Elam though he wasn’t considered the Homecoming King. There wasn’t such a thing then. 

“It was a different time,” said Stein adding that in 1973, the Vietnam War was taking place as was a draft lottery. Both cast a shadow over campus. Just three years earlier fire destroyed the ROTC annex building after two days of protests following the killings of four Kent State University students by National Guardsmen.

A long-standing Homecoming tradition, the Homecoming Court entering the stadium under a ceremonial arch of Pershing rifles held by members of the ROTC, was in question, Stein said.

“The Student Center Board sponsored Homecoming. The war was a major focal point on campus,” Stein explained. “There was major backlash against ROTC at the time.” The board struggled with whether or not to keep the tradition in the new stadium, ultimately deciding to allow it.

Elam and Stein remember comedian Bob Hope playing a role in the weekend because of his absence. Elam said that the football program the week following the Homecoming ceremony had pictures of her with information stating she had been crowned by Hope. Stein said he remembers that Hope was supposed to have been the Homecoming performance at Memorial Coliseum, but he had to cancel.

Today, Elam is a professor in the Department of Behavioral Science in the College of Medicine where she teaches first-year medical students. Stein is a retired Lexington businessman who serves as a senior advisor to the Lexington Counter Clocks, a professional baseball team. 

Photos courtesy Carol Elam, taken by Lexington Herald-Leader staff