Is That Legal?

I would agree with the assertion that kids back in the day were probably better pranksters than they are today, when now any infraction could potentially get you expelled, assessed a huge fine, or otherwise put you in jeopardy of your whole academic career.

Yes, they were quite the pranksters!

"Disorder among the students was common in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Not atypical were the 'riots' of 1799, 1816, and 1840. In his History of the University of North Carolina, Kemp P. Battle reports on students expelled or suspended for 'firing of pistols,' assault, arson, drunkenness, throwing rocks at their tutors, stealing their professor's horses, and evening dueling."

If you want to read about collegiate pranks in America (past and present (to when the book was written)), see if you can't find the book If at all possible, involve a cow. I read it years ago and it's a lot of fun.

I'd say modern pranksters (particularly MIT & Caltech, though U. Wisconsin managed some great ones in the early 1980s) are FAR more creative than some of the more straightforward destructiveness of the olden days.