Founders’ Day marks the first day of classes at UW–Madison, but it also celebrates the beginning of the Badger tradition of looking closer and digging deeper. Over the years, their curiosity brought us Vitamins A, B, and D, innovations that save lives, and even compounds that end them. Badgers put salt on our tables, then created a famous fast food to put it on. They’ve built machines to see inside the human body and developed ways to keep organs alive outside of it. Badgers traveled across the world to uncover 200,000-year-old early humans in a South African cave — and even unicorns in Laos — then returned to the UW’s backyard to find 5,200-year-old canoes resting at the bottom of Lake Mendota. Their discoveries taught us how to stay safe in the sun and led to treatments for when we don’t. They’ve perfected big swings on ice and studied the smallest things on Earth (and sometimes they’ve discovered nothing at all). Even badgers of the animal variety have contributed to archaeological discoveries. So Happy Founders’ Day, or better yet, Happy Finders’ Day!

Support future generations of Badgers with a gift to the WAA Scholarship Fund.