College Historical "facts" and probable tall tales

Parents Social Lounge
1

<p>There is a discussion in another thread about the old style dorm rooms in many New England schools that today may seem peculiar due to the roommate arrangements in these rooms. One poster (SOP 14's Mom) pointed out the historical preservation of these buildings, rather than retrofitting them to meet todays living arrangements. It made me think about the historical fun facts (which are hopefully true) vs the probable tall tales that are perpetuated at many shcools, and thought it would be fun to share some. So I'll start by repeating what I posted in the other thread, and add some other historical facts (please correct any errors) as well as some probable tall tales: </p>

<p>School: Vassar</p>

<p>1) When the Main building, designed by famed architect James Renwick (designed NY's St. Patrick cathedral), was first built it included classroom, faculty offices and student living space. For the students housing, the large room was originally more of a sitting room, or parlour, and the smaller rooms off of it were the bedrooms for the student and, in some cases there was an even smaller room for the student's "attendant". Because the closets were in the "attendant's" room, in newer days, with the front room (sitting room) now being used as a bedroom as well, they typically place one or more wooden armoires in it for closet space. The rooms (sitting rooms) are pretty big and can easily accomodate the armoires.</p>

<p>The "attendant's" room had a window that opened onto the hallway, whereas the students window faced outdoors, but on the side of the building that did not get direct sunlight (heaven forbid their delicate skin might get damaged).</p>

<p>And the dorm hallway was extremely wide. Made such that (reportedly) the students could exercise in the hallway and, more importantly, two girls could walk by each other in their hoop skirts and not touch each other. I kid you not.</p>

<p>2) Shakespeare gardens have flowers from all of his sonnets. Gardens and landscaping were designed by Frederick Olmsted (also designed NY Central Park).</p>

<p>3) Noyes dorm was designed by Eero Saarinen ( also designed the St. Louis arch). It has a great echo spot in front of the building.</p>

<p>Probable tall tales:</p>

<p>1) Jane Fonda rode a motorcycle down the hall of a dorm (the stories of which dorm and whether or not she was clothed vary)</p>

<p>2) Edna St Vincent Millay jumped out a second story window of her dorm (Jewett).</p>

<p>Others????</p>

2

<p>Old folklore at UVa: that the statues of Jefferson and Washington, would wink at each other, if a virgin passed between them.</p>

<p>Old fact: the rooms on “the Lawn” (original to campus, individual doors open to the quad,) are singles, have a sink (and some have working fireplaces,) but you have to walk outside to the bathrooms.</p>

3

<p>Thank you, jym626, for the wonderful Vassar stories! Here’s another . . .</p>

<p>The story I heard was that Jane Fonda’s Vassar career ended the day she pitched a fit about having to wear white gloves to some formal event. She finally acceded to authority . . . and showed up at the event wearing: white gloves.</p>

<p>And nothing else.</p>

4

<p>On the tours they tell you that some of the original buildings at Carnegie Mellon have sloped floors so that they could easily be converted to assembly lines if Carnegie Tech wasn’t successful.</p>

<p>Interesting architectural curiosity - at Dunster House (built in 1930) in one of the entry ways adjacent bathrooms in suites across the hall from each other share a single window so that it will look better from the outside. According to Wikipedia, “Dunster is unique among Harvard dormitories for its sixth-story walk-up (it has no elevators); these rooms were originally rented by poorer students, such as Norman Mailer.”</p>

5

<p>UCLA’s Bunche Hall was nicknamed Waffle Hall because that’s what it looks like due to even placement of small dark windows [File:Closeup,BuncheHall,UCLA.jpg</a> - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia](<a href=“http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Closeup,BuncheHall,UCLA.jpg]File:Closeup,BuncheHall,UCLA.jpg”>File:Closeup,BuncheHall,UCLA.jpg - Wikipedia) The building is raised off the ground, with a stairwell underneath rising from the ground to the first floor. It looks somewhat unwieldy.</p>

<p>Incoming freshmen were (are?) told that the strange-looking stairway is due to a problem with the original orientation of Bunche. The building is oriented so that its waffled surfaces face north and south, but the waffle originally faced east/west. The local transit authority received complaints from commuters on the nearby San Diego Freeway that the glint from the waffle’s windows was a problem. So, after consultation with various tech experts, UCLA decided to rotate the building 90 degrees to eliminate the problem. The tour guide would explain that the original stairwell shaft couldn’t be moved, and would also helpfully point out hooks protruding from the building’s top edge, where the lifting cranes and helicopters latched on to the building.</p>

6

<p>Slithey, heard the one about a huge bunker under the quad? (From Buche to the music building.) Supposedly from wartime. I do know the original area there was a ravine. And, there used to be tales of kids roaming down there.</p>

7

<p>A tall tale I heard at Yale–and that I understand has been told at other schools–is that the architect who designed the main library didn’t initially take into account the weight of all the books, and the building would have collapsed if it hadn’t been redesigned. (In the future, when this tale is told, kids will ask, “What’s a book?”)</p>

8

<p>That was also said about Northwestern’s library (which incidentally looks almost identical to U of Chicago’s library - Brutalist style). I agree, I suspect a version of this is told at a lot of schools.</p>

9

<p>

</p>

<p>That’s what happens when architects pretend to be structural engineers! :wink: (says the structural engineer…)</p>

10

<p>Some Berkeley buildings have names reflecting academic departments that no longer exist:</p>

<p>[url=&lt;a href=“http://www.berkeley.edu/map/3dmap/3dmap.shtml?hearstmining]Interactive”&gt;http://www.berkeley.edu/map/3dmap/3dmap.shtml?hearstmining]Interactive</a> map - UC Berkeley<a href=“Mining%20/%20Mineral%20Engineering”>/url</a>
[url=&lt;a href=“http://www.berkeley.edu/map/3dmap/3dmap.shtml?blum]Interactive”&gt;http://www.berkeley.edu/map/3dmap/3dmap.shtml?blum]Interactive</a> map - UC Berkeley<a href=“Naval%20Architecture”>/url</a></p>

<p>The Unabomber twice planted bombs in Cory Hall on the Berkeley campus. The building had higher security measures installed as a result – cameras recording every exterior door, higher security exterior locks, and the use of RFID card keys (when such things were novelties).</p>

11

<p>The Sterling library thing at Yale is a myth. The thing is built like a super fortress. But there are cool carvings that you can find. You can look at the books and things the various worker characters in the halls are holding. We did used to joke that the steps down into what was then “machine city” on the way to Cross Campus Library should have a sign “Abandon Hope, All Ye Who Enter Here” - or since it was Yale “Lasciate ogne speranza, voi ch’intrate”. For some reason that recalls my two favorite pieces of Yale graffiti. One was outside Morse College. It read “Criticise Eva” with an s not a z. That was Eva Balogh, their Master. The other was when they renovated the Old Campus and on the big, solid construction fence outside Connecticut Hall were scrawled in huge letters Molly Bloom’s last words from Ulysses: “and his heart was going like mad and yes I said yes I will Yes”. No one wrote over that. For context, Conn Hall is where the statue of Nathan Hale stands because he lived there. I loved the contrast.</p>

<p>(My favorite graffiti will always be from Toledo, Ohio. On the side of a bridge “Welcome to Zero City, Baby!”)</p>

<p>Frank Lloyd Wright supposedly said the only place he’d live in at Yale was Harkness Tower - which is a beautiful Gothic structure - because then he wouldn’t have to look at it. (He never said that.) There is a carillon up there, operated by the carilloners guild. One of my friends joined. On the floor below is a practice carillon. It’s hard to describe: it looks like a big loom with hand and foot pedals you whack to trigger the bells. (Carillons are now, on the whole, switching to digital triggering. Real bells, not the same carillon. A real carillon has more ease and space between the notes than a digital.) Practice times were hard to get so I’d walk her over at absurd hours in the very early morning.</p>

12

<p>Lergnom, apparently Machine City is no more, thanks to the gothicization of Cross Campus Library into Bass Library.</p>

13

<p>Son’s school relocated from Wake Forest, NC to Winston-Salem, NC in the 1950’s. The “new” campus was built during the cold war and includes LOTS of underground tunnels connecting the buildings. Supposedly, the whole place was designed as one of the evacuation destinations for the POTUS. Basically, WFU is a bunker.</p>

<p>Daughter’s school is surrounded by battlefields. During the Civil War, campus buildings served as a hospital and shelter for soldiers on both sides. Dozens, scores, if not hundreds, of men died there. Needless to say, Gettysburg College is haunted.</p>

14

<p>When I was a tour guide, I learned a lot of these. Supposedly students used Revolutionary War cannonballs to heat their rooms in Hollis Hall by baking them in the fireplace for a while and then rolling them into the center of the room to radiate heat.</p>

<p>There was a fire in 1764 that consumed all of the books in John Harvard’s original donation to the college, except for one called “Christian Warfare Against the Devill, World, and Flesh,” which is still on display. The book survived because a student had sneaked it out of the library in violation of the rules. That part is definitely true – the legend is that when he returned the precious relic, the College thanked him, and then expelled him for borrowing it without permission.</p>

15

<p>Watch for the many versions of this name as a screenname on cc: George P. Burdell. He is a fictitious student officially enrolled at Georgia Tech in 1927 as a practical joke. Since then, he has supposedly received all undergraduate degrees offered by Georgia Tech, served in the military, gotten married, and served on Mad magazine’s Board of Directors, among other accomplishments. Burdell at one point even led the online poll for Time’s 2001 Person of the Year award. He has evolved into an important and notorious campus tradition; all Georgia Tech students learn about him at orientation</p>

16

<p>There are so many stories about schools with sinking libraries due to the weight of the books, that snopes.com has an entry about it:</p>

<p>[snopes.com:</a> Sinking Library](<a href=“http://www.snopes.com/college/halls/sinking.asp]snopes.com:”>The Sinking Library | Snopes.com)</p>

<p>At DS’s school, the story had a slight variation - they could only put books on every other floor because of the weight (they have a high-rise library).</p>

17

<p>

</p>

<p>If it is UMass Amherst, I believe that is true. Not so much due to the weight of the books as the poor construction of the building in the 1960’s. Most state buildings in MA are crumbling in one way or another.</p>

18

<p>^Yes, it is UMass Amherst, and no, it isn’t true. :D</p>

19

<p>UW has a number of them
Humanities Building was built backwards on site because architect had budget cut at last minute-False</p>

<p>Frank Lloyd Wright was injured working on construction of Science Hall-True</p>

20

<p>Harvard’s Widener Library commemorates Harry Elkins Widener, 1907 Harvard graduate, a book collector and victim of the Titanic disaster. His mother donated millions to Harvard for the library to be built.
The false legend connected to the library is that as a condition of her bequest, Mrs. Widener requested a new requirement: all students had to to pass a swim test [snopes.com:</a> The Swim Test](<a href=“http://www.snopes.com/college/admin/swimtest.asp]snopes.com:”>The Swim Test | Snopes.com)</p>