he true colors of the University of Michigan are maize and blue, right? Of course they are and they always have been. However, which maize or shade of yellow and which blue have been subject to poetic interpretation, personal preference, evolving tradition, and variations in definition for almost 150 years.

The first recorded association of any color with the University appears in 1859, when a ribbon of deep blue was attached to the diploma of an Elisha Jones.

Not long afterward, in 1867, a committee of students from the Literary department was appointed to select and recommend emblematic colors for the University. At a meeting in the College Chapel that Feb. 12, the students made the following report:

"Your committee, appointed to select emblematic colors for our University, unanimously agree in presenting as their choice, Azure Blue and Maize, and recommend that the following resolution be adopted: `Resolved, that Azure Blue and Maize be adopted as the emblematic colors of the University of Michigan."

The resolution passed. Though heartfelt, however, the recommendation fell subject to the inexactitudes of the times-no standards for colors existed; no artifacts represented exact shades of maize or blue. And so began varied attempts over the ensuing years to provide standard definitions or descriptions of the University's colors, often by citing dictionary definitions, including the following:

Azure:
Oxford Dictionary 1888:
The precious stone lapis lazuli.
A bright blue pigment (A. of Almayne, Prussian blue).
The clear blue color of the unclouded sky, or of the sea reflecting it (originally, the deep intense blue of more southern latitudes).

Century Dictionary 1895:
The fine blue color of the sky.
Cobalt blue (a pure blue tending toward cyan-blue and of high luminosity).

Standard Dictionary 1895:
A clear blue; the color of the sky.
A sky-blue pigment, usually cobalt blue, but sometimes ultramarine and smalt [a ceramic pigment-Ed.].

Lapis lazuli
Webster's New International 1909:
The clear blue color of the sky.

Maize
Oxford 1888:
Indian corn.
One of the coal-tar colors, a pale yellow resembling that of maize.
Maize-Yellow, a yellow like that of maize.

Century 1895:
A coal-tar color, the sodium salt of the di-sulphonic acid of azoxy-stilbene. It dyes silk and wool reddish-yellow in an acid bath.
Also called sun-yellow.

Standard 1895:
Indian corn. Maize Yellow. A yellow like maize.

Webster's New International 1909:
Maize yellow. A delicate pale yellow.

Evidently, even with these guidelines, uncertainty existed as to the exact hues of azure blue and maize. Artifacts collected from close to the turn of the century show variations in use from dark blue to a very pale "sky" blue.

Shades of both the yellow and the blue became increasingly lighter over time, as the definitions from the 1909 Webster's indicate. Baby blue and pale lemon yellow were deemed too anemic for the mighty Wolverines, however, and around the turn of the century the U-M Athletic Association unofficially adopted its own deep blue and bright yellow for team uniforms. But the pale colors continued to prevail in official circles.

For many years Michigan in effect had two sets of colors, one for athletics and a shifting set for other functions. This situation continued until the celebration of the University's 75th anniversary in 1912. (Dualism is common to the University; the 1912 anniversary was calculated from the 1837 date for the U-M's origin, rather than the 1817 date, which also is used, because it was then that a Board of Regents founded an institution that later became the University. As a result, U-M has double opportunities to celebrate every grand anniversary.)

In 1912, the University Senate appointed a committee to come up with a consistent representation for all decorations, robes and flags. The chairman was Prof. Warren P. Lombard, Physiology. Other members were Professors S. Lawrence Bigelow, Chemistry; H.R. Cross, Fine Arts; Emil Lorch, Architecture; and University Librarian Theodore W. Koch. The charge was to "determine the exact shades of maize and azure blue which would be suitable for the official colors of the University and embody them in some lasting form."

Lombard's committee searched out early diploma ribbons, dance cards from the 1890s and programs from various events, assembling an array of rich blues and saturated but clean yellows. They selected a group of professors, students, alumni and administrators to vote their preferences of the collected color samples. By this process they arrived at a recommendation to the Senate, and subsequently to the Regents of the University, that their proposed colors be adopted as Michigan's official colors.

From the March meeting of the Regents, 1912:

Doctor W.P. Lombard, Chairman of a Senate Committee, presented a report with regard to the exact shades of the University colors, maize and azure blue. On motion of Regent Beal, the Board voted that these colors, in the shades filed by Professor Lombard with the Secretary as one of the exhibits of this meeting, should hereafter be the official "maize and azure blue" colors.

The second part of the committee's mission was "to embody them [the colors] in some lasting form." This task was to become Lombard's plague. Seeking to embody the colors, Lombard commissioned enamels from the best artisans in New York and Norway to match the selected colors, but none could guarantee an exact match. So the colors remained embodied in the form of several sets of broad grosgrain ribbons that were distributed to a University book store, robe manufacturers and the Secretary of the University, who placed them among the records of the Faculty Senate. In 1935, the ribbons were deposited in the newly established University Archives.

But after 1912, the existence of the official ribbons faded from people's minds, and the University colors began to fade again. Again, too, it was among official circles that pale blue and creamy yellow took hold. And again the Athletic Department adopted its own rich, vibrant hues of blue and gold, followed by the University Medical Center, which selected yet another set of official standard colors.

As a graphic designer, I felt the search for a standard, official, consistent color to represent the University was a driving mission. I tracked every reasonable reference in the historical literature. On a fluke, I followed up an obscure reference to the minutes of the senate meeting of 1912. In the file at the Bentley Historical Library were the ribbons with the official shades of azure blue and maize that Lombard's committee had chosen as Michigan's colors. All this time, as if hiding in the Bentley, were ribbons of rich, deep, pure blue, and a soft yellow---the color of the summer's finest filled-with-sunshine sweet corn.

Graphic designer Liene Karels, an MFA alumna of the School of Art and an assistant in the President's Office, thanks former President James J. Duderstadt and his wife, Anne, "for taking great interest in this project and encouraging me in it."