Brett Kavanaugh Yearbook Now Available Online
The 1983 yearbook from Georgetown Preparatory School has been in headlines for days. Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh and his friend Mark Judge, named as a potential witness to the alleged sexual assault experienced by Christine Blasey Ford, both attended this school. Now, the yearbook can be viewed by anyone at the Internet Archive.
Until now, only a few pages from the yearbook have been available. The copy of the yearbook uploaded to the Archive is still incomplete, but it contains many pages that have not been made public before, according to the Washington Examiner.
The Internet Archive is a nonprofit digital library.
Three women who knew Kavanaugh while he was a student at Georgetown Prep, including Christine Blasey Ford, have said they personally experienced sexual assault or harassment at his hands during this time. Ford provided testimony to the Senate Judiciary Committee about her experience last week.
There were many questionable phrases written in Kavanaugh’s yearbook that have raised eyebrows. During his testimony before the Judiciary Committee last week, Kavanaugh provided explanations for some of the more incendiary terms.
Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI) summed up the feelings of many when he spoke directly to Kavanaugh at the hearing, saying “I don’t believe ‘boof’ is flatulence, I don’t believe a ‘devil’s triangle’ is a drinking game, and I don’t believe calling yourself a girl’s ‘alumnius’ is being her friend.”
If social media is any indication, lots of other people aren’t buying it either.
Based on extensive interviews by me and @katekelly with Kavanaugh's former Georgetown Prep classmates, what he just said about the meanings of "boofed" and "Devil's Triangle" is not true.
— David Enrich (@davidenrich) September 27, 2018
The term “boofed,” according to a report from CBS News, is frequently used as a slang term that involves drugs, anal sex, or both.
The phrase “Renate Alumnius” is found 14 times on various pages of the yearbook. Renate is said to refer to Renate Schroeder, who attended a school near Georgetown Prep. Two former classmates of Kavanaugh’s both said that this term is an inside joke about sexual activities that took place with Renate Schroeder.
Kavanaugh says the phrase merely means that he was friends with Renate. According to his testimony, it was “clumsily intended to show affection and that she was one of us.”
Schroeder has stated that “the insinuation is horrible, hurtful and simply untrue.”
Kavanaugh's yearbook reads like the comic strip of a douchebag action hero: BOOF! VARSITY! WHO WON, ANYWAY? RENATE ALUMNUS! BEACH WEEK RALPH CLUB! DEVIL’S TRIANGLE?! HOW YA’ DOIN’? pic.twitter.com/iRLArqwYb3
— Francesca Fiorentini (@franifio) October 2, 2018
The yearbook now available through the Internet Archive doesn’t contain every page printed in the book that year, but the pages that are included are not redacted. The yearbook can be browsed under the heading “Cupola 1983.”
Mark Graham, director of the Wayback Machine at the Internet Archive, released a statement about the newly available documents. “By providing access to the 1983 Georgetown Prep yearbook, the Internet Archive is serving its mission as a library, helping people more fully understand the context of Brett Kavanaugh’s nomination to the Supreme Court.”
