A look into Nixa’s mascot Baldwin
Baldwin, Nixa High School’s bald eagle mascot, hypes up crowds at football games, often doing jumping jacks with the cheerleaders after a touchdown.
As the school’s mascot, Baldwin is meant to embody Nixa pride. Yet the eagle has inspired mixed reactions from students and the person inside the costume, who has asked to remain anonymous and will be referred to as Baldwin.
The eagle costume is large, padded and designed to make the mascot appear more muscular and birdlike.
“It’s a long process,” Baldwin said. “It takes two people to help me even get into the suit, and my pants almost fall every game.”
Performing in the eagle suit can get warm and stuffy for Baldwin.
“I like the design of our school mascot, but if I had a choice, I would add a fan,” Baldwin said. “It’s way too hot.”
Despite the heat of the costume, Baldwin only has one thing on his mind while performing: creating the happy faces in the crowd.
“It’s challenging to help the kids stay happy, making the crowd stay happy even if the game itself isn’t going well,” Baldwin said. “I really just do this for the kids, to make sure they have a good time.”
Although mascots normally hide their identities, Baldwin said personal traits do affect the way he performs his character.
“I’m really fun and energetic,” Baldwin said. “I really love to build people up and I’m all about friendship. One thing to know about Baldwin is that he is always willing to take a picture or give a hug.”
Freshman cheerleader Kassidy Bodenstein said Baldwin plays an important role for the cheer team.
“Baldwin lightens the mood and brings a great sense of spirit to our school,” Bodenstein said. “He is always happy to say ‘Hi,’ to the waving children coming by. It’s the sweetest thing that they get so excited to see our best cheerleader of all, Baldwin.”
While Bodenstein enjoys Baldwin’s presence on the field, junior Keegan Sandgren said that the school mascot should be a different type of bird.
“It should be a bird who actually represents our area and lives here,” Sandgren said. “A vulture would be a way better fit. They should at least make it more cartoonish, because his eyes and feathers are trying way too hard to be realistic.”
Senior Cannon Davis was the former mascot, and said he looks back fondly on the time he spent in the bird suit even when mistakes happened.
“There was one time where Baldwin’s pants came down in front of the whole crowd,” Davis said. “Another time, I walked around the concession stands and picked out Swedish Fish for myself since I was an eagle, just to get horribly robbed by a student running past. When I went back to the stands later as a student, one of the police officers came up to me and handed me the bag of Swedish fish, still not sure how he knew it was me.”
