Not to disagree with anything that
0mnidirecti0nalHal0, above, has written, but there is I believe, a bit more to the origin of this reference to Engineers at the
University of Toronto.
I had the pleasure of knowing many on the Brute Force Committee, and reading the Toike Oike--and knowing its first female editor--who wasn't, as I remember her, an engineer; though she did hang with them.
The tradition of the skulemen began with their faculty building, a red brick structure that stood at the south of the front campus, opposite University College, south of the old library--which is on the east side of the circle, and now called the Wallace Reading Room--immediately east of Convocation Hall, making one foot of the south entrance to the front campus from College street. (The west side of the cicle, funning north is first, the Administration Offices, and the the University Bookroom.)
So it stood on the spot now occupied by the Faculty of Medical Sciences building.
It was known as the little red skulehouse.
It was long gone by my day--I am Arts, class of '74. But my parents, who were there just after WWII, long before the building of my New College, often spoke of it, and the traditions of the skulemen.