A Brief History

What is hashing? * Humble Beginnings * Hares and Hounds * Today's Hash

Hashing is a lot of things, but mainly it’s a state of mind…. going back to when things were simpler, when friends were real, when nothing felt better than "kick-the-can" on a moonlit and balmy summer night, running barefooted at top speed in the woods - catch or be caught. Bonfires, secret rituals, songs and nick names, muddy feet, skinned knees and maybe even skinny-dipping…."did I see what I think I did?" I don’t mean to get carried away here, but you get the idea….

The Hash House Harriers received its humble beginnings in 1938 from a Britisher named Albert Stephen Ignatius Gispert ("G"), in what is now Malaysia. Having a fondness for the "paper chase", he gathered together several expatriates to form a group in Kuala Lumpur that would later become a world-wide legacy. There are currently almost 1500 Hashes, including groups in almost every major city in the world.

Hares and Hounds style chases have been around for centuries in one form or another. Of course the original concept was to mimic the hunting sport during times or in locations where sporting game was sparse or children mimicking the hunt as practiced by adults. This sport was well entrenched long before these sportsmen became known as "Hashers". The sport was referred to as Hares and Hounds or the Paper Chase. The hares were given a six-minute head start, then the pack was off. When Scent was located, the member of the Pack calls "Forward!" instead of the currently traditional "On-On!", otherwise the description of the Trail is a typical cross-country fare familiar to all Harriers – meadow, hedgerow, fence crossings, plowed fields, thorns, brooks, Shiggy and hills. Members of the Pack worked together finding Scent and straining to keep up with the FRB's (Front Running Bastards), as we call them today. The disappointment of the DFL's (Dead Fucking Last's), again a term of today, was depicted as they contemplate short-cutting to the finish and being among the first historical SCB's (Short Cutting Bastards). The name was chosen from their Club Chambers nickname, Hash House, where much of the discussion concerning creating the Hash developed, thus dubbed the Hash House Harriers.

Today, the term "Hash" refers to 

(1) the actual run
(2) the running group and 
(3) the flour, that marks the Trail Hashers follow. 

Here’s how it works: some members of the group (usually two) are designated the "Hares", the remainder of the Pack are the "Hounds". The Hares set Trail with puffs of flour (Chad) and get a 10 – 12 minute head start. Then the Hounds are off in pursuit of the Hares and must follow Scent.