Jayhawks and Tigers don't normally mix.

But when floodwater rolls and levees are threatened, Missouri and Kansas fans unite. They might not like it, but they unite.

"Hawks have a place in life. I don't want to eliminate them. I want to use them," says University of Missouri graduate Norman Haerr, once again a rock the past two weeks as crews fought the Mississippi River in West Quincy, Mo.

It all started early in the fight when levee crew leader Bo Knapheide, a proud Kansas University grad, wore a shirt that read, "Kansas: Protecting America from Missouri since 1854."

You have to remember the bitterness of this collegiate rivalry. The two schools first matched up in football in 1891 and Missouri leads the all-time series 54-53-9. Of course, that counts a forfeit victory in 1960 that Kansas doesn't acknowledge, even though the Jayhawks used an ineligible player.

Former Kansas football coach Don Fambrough was once urged by doctors to get medical attention across the state line in Kansas City, Mo.

"I'll die first!" Fambrough reportedly said.

Former Missouri basketball coach Norm Stewart refused to quarter his team inside the Kansas border when they played in Lawrence. He either would have the team fly or bus in for the game, and leave immediately afterward. Legend has it that he refused to buy gasoline or food in Kansas because he didn't want to help the state's economy.

So Haerr and his sons stood tall when confronting Knapheide and the Jayhawk supporters. Fighting the flood was serious business and physically exhausting, but both sides always took time to jab home the needles.

Haerr is about the most God-fearing man you could ever meet, but when he started talking about the poster made by Jayhawk supporters pinned on the West Quincy command post wall, well, you could hear him mutter something not so nice under his breath.

The poster was placed on the east wall of the main room with the caption "Jayhawk Brigade, Here To Bag The Tigers." Both the Jayhawk and the Tiger were shown filling sandbags.

Of course, the Jaywalk was filling a 10-pound bag and the Tiger a 5-pound bag.

This poster, above a table where most of the food for lunch and dinner was placed, went unchallenged until late last week. Norm called his son and daughter to action, and they responded with a beauty.

Up above the Jayhawk poster was placed a "Chef Truman" poster with the caption: "Tonight's Special -- Jayhawk Strips. Tastes Like Chicken!"

It showed the Tiger holding a Jayhawk beside another caption: "Cooked in Mississippi Boil!"

That apparently got Bo's father, Knapheide Manufacturing President and CEO Harold Knapheide III, fired up. Rumor has it he was spotted in several Quincy paint stores over the weekend, getting ready to paint the command post Jayhawk blue.

Turns out the river started dropping and the command post was no longer needed after Monday, or it might have gotten a Kansas-inspired redecoration.

"Nah, it's still a bare wall there," Norm Haerr said Monday afternoon. "I think they've accepted that the Missouri Tigers are the top dog. I really believe so."

But here's the bottom line. A lot of unnamed volunteers spent backbreaking hours keeping the levee safe. Heaven forbid, a Michigan Wolverine fan even worked on the levee last week, and he didn't have the Hart to tell the Jayhawk and Mizzou fans they were battling for second and third place.

"Borders don't separate friendships and good workers," Haerr said. "We overlook some of those things. If they are willing workers, we'll accept them."

The levee held. So did fierce Jayhawk and Mizzou loyalties.

As it should be!

-- rhart@whig.com/221-3370