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Straight Ahead

One hundred years after Willard Straight 1901 died in World War I, his legacy lives on in the iconic building that bears his name

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A More Perfect Union?

Vintage photo of the building under construction, surrounded by scaffolding

The building under construction.RMC

By the time Willard Straight Hall was completed in November 1925 after twenty months of construction, Cornellians were itching to get a look inside: according to the Daily Sun, some 4,800 people—students, faculty, and local residents—streamed through the front door to view “this new and tremendous institution of Cornell” on opening day, and 3,000 more the next. “After holding its mounting curiosity in leash for months, practically all undergraduate Cornell swarmed in to inspect and enjoy the magnificent building,” the Alumni News noted. As it enthused in the following issue: “The University is still rubbing its eyes and trying to realize that this marvelous building is all its own . . . Visitors were more impressed than their words indicated by the munificent outlay of costly furnishings, designed to provide all the comforts any hard-working student or professor could ask for, and by the unostentatious dignity of the whole building.”

Back then, not just anyone could avail themselves of the Straight’s comforts; after a five-day open house, it was members only. But that “membership” was expansive: all undergrads were automatically included, and for $8 a year (about $115 in today’s dollars), faculty, trustees, and grad students could join (as could alumni, for $5). “Membership of persons in the Faculty and Trustees class,” the Alumni News noted, “will carry with it the extension of privileges of the Hall to their wives.” Still, those wives were presumably not entitled to walk in through the front door. In the Straight’s early years, there were separate entrances and social spaces for men and women: the former used the grand portal at the front, while the latter came in through smaller doors on the south side. As University Archivist Emerita Elaine Engst, MA ’72, notes, the building’s benefactor—Willard’s widow, Dorothy Payne Whitney Straight—looked askance at the segregation. “Dorothy was explicitly not happy about that,” Engst says. “It made her really angry.”

A vintage photo of men playing pool in the 1950s.

Playing billiards in the Fifties.RMC

But it could have been worse. Many had wanted Cornell to follow the example of other schools—including the University of Toronto, which Dorothy had visited on a fact-finding tour during the project’s planning stages—who reserved their student unions for men. As Rebecca Cofer wrote in her 1990 book The Straight Story, the separate entrances were a compromise proposed by the architect, “with the idea that women once inside the building would go to the ‘men’s side’ to buy their tickets for various events at the lobby desk, and eventually male and female students would mix freely, ‘except perhaps for the pool room, and barber shop.’ ”

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Eating in the Okenshields dining hall this semester.Usavage

Playing billiards and getting a haircut were just two of the Straight’s many offerings. It had a cafeteria, a library, a music room, lounges, living quarters, and a state-of-the-art theater, complete with orchestra pit and rotating stage. (The inaugural show—a drama club production of an eighteenth-century American comedy called The Contrast—starred future Oscar nominee Franchot Tone ’27.) For students, Cofer noted, the Straight offered “a nice place to go between classes, and a convenient and central place to meet friends, have a cup of coffee, or eat lunch.” It was especially appealing to those who hadn’t joined the Greek system, as E.B. White 1921 observed in an essay. “Before Willard Straight Hall was erected as a pleasance for the independent students, there was a disadvantage in not belonging to a fraternity,” he wrote, adding that the building “now offers all the comforts of home to everybody, and the fraternities are beginning to feel the way speakeasies felt after repeal: that there is nothing to be exclusive about anymore.”

Ever-Evolving Space

Erected on the former site of two professorial cottages, the Straight was built into the side of Libe Slope—an idiosyncratic configuration that puts the main entrance on the fourth floor. It cost $1.5 million to build—just over $21 million in today’s dollars, which seems an enormous bargain—and another $100,000 to furnish ($1.4 million today). In the near-century since it opened, the Straight has seen countless logistical changes. For example, the space just inside the main entrance that used to be the barber shop (and later a bank) is now a conference room; the former billiard room is a dance studio, with mirrored walls and a commanding view of Ho Plaza. The theater, though still operational for live perform­ances and recently renovated, has been home to Cornell Cinema since the late Eighties, when the Schwartz Center for the Performing Arts was built in College­town. A ceramics studio, an ice cream shop, various TV lounges—those and many other amenities have come and gone over the years.

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Studying in the library this fall.Usavage

What used to be bedrooms on the fifth floor for students and guests were converted to other uses decades ago—though you can still see the outlines on the walls where sinks once hung, and several offices sport medicine cabinets. The Memorial Room—the building’s showplace, which recent grads have compared to the Hogwarts dining hall from Harry Potter—was originally outfitted as a lounge, with sumptuous couches; it has long been a multi-purpose space hosting everything from dances to career fairs. The inviting stone terrace on the fourth floor, originally located one level down and raised to accommodate an additional dining facility during World War II, now hosts summer weddings and outdoor film screenings. Where the Straight once had a single eating option, it now has three (four, if you count the free popcorn in the lobby): the Ivy Room, an “à la carte” establishment located in the original cafeteria space on the third floor; Okenshields, an “all-you-care-to-eat” place next door, for students on the dining plan; and Straight from the Market, a new counter service spot opened this semester on the fourth floor, offering grab-and-go meals with an emphasis on fresh produce.

Indian dancers leap in the air in synchronicity.

An Indian dance performance in 2016 in the Memorial Room.Jason Koski/UREL

Just as the building’s logistics have shifted, so have those of the wider campus—and those changes have lessened the Straight’s prominence in student life over the past half-century. Most saliently, the variety of dining options that have cropped up across campus since the Seventies has meant that fewer students make multiple daily trips to the Straight for meals. But the building’s fundamental purpose—uniting Cornellians across colleges, majors, and geography—has stayed the same. “What we see in the Straight now, and what we’ve seen for decades, is that it’s one of the few places at Cornell that isn’t tied to a single academic college,” says Dean of Students Vijay Pendakur, whose offices are located on the second floor. “It’s not tied to a department or program, and the students know that; they feel that. When I’m walking around this building I see interesting cross-pollinations happen as a result.”

Two tables are set up in the lobby of WSH where students sit for their causes.

Students “tabling” this fall in the Straight’s lobby, home to a colorful series of allegorical murals.Allison Usavage

In the Straight, the word “tabling” doesn’t refer to parliamentary procedure: it’s the act of sitting at a folding table in the lobby, soliciting passers-by to join a club, take up a cause, or buy tickets to an event. “Students will interact across tables—the ecological sustainability group will be tabling next to the undergraduate veterans’ group, and they’ll have a conversation because they’re sitting there waiting for people to come up and talk to them,” Pendakur says. “The prescience in Willard’s vision of giving the gift that could create this building was recognizing that Cornellians need a place to gather where they’re identifying not by college or by academic pursuit, but by their broader human interest. That’s part of what enriches the Cornell student experience and makes it not just a process of getting a baccalaureate degree, but of becoming an adult and emerging as a fully fleshed person and not just a fully fleshed mind.”

Especially during the tumultuous days of the Sixties and Seventies, the Straight› was a nexus for debate and political action. For years, a six-foot-tall stump outside the entrance—the last vestige of the row of stately trees that graced campus before perishing of Dutch elm disease—served as a soapbox for all manner of orators. And of course, the Straight was the site of the single most dramatic event in University history: the April 1969 takeover by African American students advocating for academic and social change. (During the takeover, which took place on Parent’s Weekend, visiting families were rousted from the Straight’s guestrooms, which were phased out afterward.)

Logistical Hurdles

But as Pendakur notes, the building that was a marvel nearly a century ago has serious limitations to serving today’s student body. For one thing, it’s not big enough; Cornell has more than 24,000 students today, compared to about 5,600 in 1925. “The square footage of this building and the number of reservable rooms are totally incommensurate with that size of a campus,” Pendakur says. “Students are always saying, ‘I can’t get a room in the Straight unless I book months and months out.’ From about 5 p.m. to 11 p.m. the whole year, every reservable space in this building is booked, because it’s one of the few places that any student can reserve a room. So we need to triple the square footage of reservable space to meet the needs. I don’t even know if that would get us there, but it would be a lot closer.”

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An agricultural fair in the Seventies in the Memorial Room.RMC

Another major issue is that the Straight’s core heating, ventilation, and electrical systems essentially date from the Jazz Age. (And even then, there were issues: the building suffered blackouts both on its opening day and during the official dedication ceremony the following month.) Due to electrical load limitations, the Straight can’t be wired for now-typical tech services like “smart rooms” for videoconferencing. For the same reason, there’s little air conditioning, mainly limited to some window units—meaning that temperatures can soar into the nineties with high humidity, and on the hottest days some staff have to be temporarily relocated. Even the sound design in the Memorial Room is a relic of an earlier time. “The acoustics were set up to capture echoes and reverberate them, essentially as a low-tech way to amplify the unamplified voice,” Pendakur says. “The minute you have somebody on a mic with speakers, the acoustics are awful—it echoes all over the place and cancels out people’s ability to hear effectively.”

Then there’s the problem of accessibility. Built long before the Americans with Disabilities Act, the Straight is challenging to navigate in a wheelchair. There’s only a freight elevator (run by a full-time attendant), located in inconvenient, back-of-house areas. Of the building’s six main floors, there’s no elevator access at all to the top two—and the same goes for some “half” floors accessible through small, narrow staircases. When Pendakur arrived, in fact, the Dean of Students’ office was located on the “fourth-and-a-half” floor, in a charming, wood-paneled suite complete with (nonworking) fireplace. But Pendakur immediately knew that he should relocate; his current office, in a renovated section of the second floor, can be reached via the freight elevator—not an ideal solution, but an improvement. Says Pendakur: “I think the dean of students at any school in the country would be concerned if a certain portion of the student body or faculty, staff, and parents couldn’t access their office.”

And as Pendakur points out, the issue of establishing full elevator service in the Straight goes beyond wheelchair access; parents pushing strollers—like his wife, who’d need to navigate the freight elevator to visit him at work with their two small children—are also limited, among others. “For people who have temporary mobility issues or who are in a late-term pregnancy, this is a very difficult building to manage,” he says. “That’s a key concern, because part of telling a campus, ‘This is your space,’ is also saying, ‘You can access it.’ ”

With the centennial of the Straight’s opening coming up in 2025, the University is eyeing a major renovation and expansion—potentially, Pendakur says, as part of the next capital campaign. “There is a pretty vibrant conversation right now, all the way up to the highest level of University leadership,” Pendakur says. “There’s some buzz in a way that I don’t think there has been in the past. It would be a real opportunity if we could come to an accord as a university that we want to prioritize this building for a full gut rehab plus expansion. Expansion is imperative; if we want to be relevant and call ourselves the student union for the University, we’ve got to dramatically increase the square footage. If that becomes a capital priority, we could really change the co-curricular experience for students here.”

Wood carved owl on a banister.

The building’s many architectural details add to its charm.Usavage

According to Lisa Anderson, director of facilities for Student and Campus Life, a major study of the building is being planned over the next five years, to explore how best to enlarge and modernize the Straight while retaining its historic character. She points out that one of the enduring challenges of caring for a building like the Straight is maintaining and restoring the work of its original artisans, from the many intricate woodcarvings to the murals that grace both the main lobby and the Cornell Cinema auditorium. “We’re having a hard time locating folks that can do that work,” Anderson says, “and it’s very expensive.”

The lobby murals, painted starting in spring 1926, are a nod to the building’s namesake. As a placard reads, the images “reflect [Straight’s] diplomatic and business career in China, his broad interests in the arts, and his overall enthusiasm for life.” The artist, Ezra Winter, was a prominent muralist whose works grace Rockefeller Center and the Library of Congress. Using paint that included whey from the University dairy herd, he created scenes representing such human virtues as chivalry, adventure, diplomacy, creativity, and optimism. “Face the front entrance and look for the Latin words from Terence encased in a holly wreath: ‘HUMANI NIHIL-A-ME ALIENVM PVTO,’ ” Cofer wrote in The Straight Story. “Liberally translated it means ‘Nothing in the realm of men is alien to me,’ a fitting quotation for Willard Straight.”

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27 thoughts on “Straight Ahead

  1. '59, Chi Psi

    The print version of the Straight article asks for memorable experiences at the Straight.
    In the late ’50s folk singer Pete Seeger came to the central hall. During a lumberjack song he repeatedly whacked a tree stump prop with his big axe after each phrase or verse. What resonance!
    And a small parlor at the south entrance was the listening room, quiet for reading but mainly used for listening to classical LPs, hearing my first Sibelius, Borodin, and Bach.

  2. Willard Straight 1901 was a fellow fraternity brother and is honored in our shelter with other brothers who gave the “supreme sacrifice” for our country in a plaque which I have attached here. Additionally, I have the “obituary” from the Delta Tau Delta national newsletter, The Rainbow, which highlighted Brother Straight’s life and actions during the War to End All Wars. Brother Straight is interned at the American Battle Monuments Commission Cemetery in Suresnes just outside of Paris, France. There are at least two other Cornellians interned at Suresnes, Brother Jesse Morse Robinson 1916, and Frederick Drake (unknown year of graduation).

  3. Cornell '81

    Never forget the Help Desk at WSH, Cornell’s very own early-gen Google. 2-3456 was the number to call from your dorm room phone. I was one of three student night managers at WSH from 1979-1981, and it was a highlight from my years at Cornell.

  4. Architecture '52

    In the early 1950’s the renowned architect, Frank Lloyd Wright, was on campus at various venues and appearances, one of which was a small, private luncheon in the Straight with a small group of Architecture students, including myself. He had previously described the University of Pittsburgh’s Gothic skyscraper “Cathedral of Learning” as “the biggest keep-off-the-grass sign in the world.” As we walked into the Straight with him, he was applying similar comments to the architecture of the Straight, which of course was totally foreign to his own concept of architecture — oneness with nature, etc. This continued as we walked with him through the building from the front entrance over to the dining room on the south side. I ended up sitting right across the table from him and noted that, in spite of his dislike of the Straight’s architecture, he did really enjoy his Straight lunch.

  5. Class of 1962

    It was the center of my life at Cornell.
    From reading rides home , playing pool, eating in the Ivy room and napping in the library, it was a respite from my busy college life.
    Thank you Willard!

  6. 1964, 1966

    I remember “Willard Straight” and “Willard State” (a mental hospital) used to explain the nature of a phoneme and a morpheme in Professor Hockett’s text for Linguistics 101. It had particular meaning for me in that I did volunteer work at the latter.
    Other experiences at Willard Straight included:
    – As a freshman living in University Halls discovering the Elmira Room’s Sunday evening buffet.
    – Being stunned in the Music Room the first time I heard Carmina Burana.
    – Being moved by the production of The Fantastiks.
    – Seeing a French version of Faust, with my friend Dick Feldman (later head of Cornell’s language lab) playing the devil.
    – Hearing my British Drama Professor Caputo as the protagonist of one of Shakespeare’s historical plays.
    – Enjoying the ribald and raucous Lysistrata.
    – Watching on the main floor TV the New York Giants (Y A Tittle to Del Shofner) victorious.
    – The time I was staying over Thanksgiving and enjoyed some popcorn the kitchen staff made in one of the fireplaces.
    – Spring of ’64 often got a brownie in the Ivy Room before my afternoon jog, listening to the Beatles’ songs rolling in.

  7. 1961

    My memory was jogged by the description in the print article about the gender segregation in parts of the Straight. When I was told in my Junior year at the University that there were no women allowed in the Pool Room I convinced my then boyfriend (now husband) Marshall Frank, Class of 61, and our fellow Cornellians and best friends Nancy Simon, Class of 62, and her then boyfriend (now husband) Morton Hodin, Class of 61, to defy the ban. We went up to the Pool Room and played part of a game together. I had never played pool before and was not overly impressed with the game. The room was darkish and sparsely occupied at the time as can be seen in the photo accompanying the print article. We were the recipients of a few glares from the men in the room but nothing was said to us and after a while we got bored and left.
    We thought that was the end of the escapade but the next day an article in the Daily Sun appeared calling out the blasphemy of the co-eds who had invaded the male sanctity of the Pool Room. No one knew our names since we were never approached and we have been anonymous to this day. My cover is blown!

    Rosanna Frank
    Class of 61

    • 1969

      Good for you. I spent too many hours shooting pool there and would have welcomed some diversity in 1966. But, maybe it was there and all I could see were balls of stripes and solids.

  8. 1990

    I used to study in the music room, eat in Okenshields, watch movies at Cornell Cinema and I belonged to several clubs that had offices in the Straight. I took part in many demonstrations in front of the Straight. I was back for a visit recently and I still love that building. Thanks, Williard. I hope the renovations don’t destroy the building’s historical character and coziness.

  9. 1972

    Thank you for this charming article. The idea that Straight requested his widow to do something “to make [Cornell] a more human place” is more than quaint, but that’s exactly what she did. Several comments recall the listening (or music) room. What a magical spot! On Sundays it was always packed solid and the music was always loud. Lots of very serious listeners. Very rarely do I find myself wallowing in Big Red nostalgia but this piece left me helpless.

  10. ILR 1964

    The “Straight” was an important place for me, arriving as a transfer and working the summers of 1961 and ’62 as a lifeguard at the Beebe Lake bridge and gorge. I was living in the attic of the Schoellkopf building at the east end of The Crescent, which also had the football coaches’ offices and team dressing rooms below during the regular academic year. I often took meals at the Straight, took summer courses, and did my distance running training in the evenings, mostly at the CU golf course. I really appreciated the use and comforts of the library, and also the early Cornell Cinema summer offerings. I even hosted a 10-year old boy from Harlem for several weeks at CU with the Herald-Tribune Fresh Air Fund. Lots of good memories….

  11. 1952

    My first experience at the Straight was the fall day in 1948 when my father dropped me off to begin my freshman year. Unlike today’s freshmen who arrive with a trailer full of clothes and furniture, I only had a small suitcase and an old footlocker that had been in the family for 30 years. It was a Sunday, and Dad had to make the then 12-hour drive home in order to go to work the next day. I was on wait-list for a dorm room so had nowhere to take my stuff. So Dad left me in front of the Straight, shook my hand (we didn’t hug in those days!), and said “Good bye and good luck” and left me there to fend for myself!

    Later that fall, I joined the Straight’s “Men’s and Women’s Activities Committee” and ultimately spent many, many hours at the Straight chairing several Straight Committees and serving on the Board of Directors my senior year. The Straight had a wonderful staff to guide us and my participation there probably prepared me for my business career better than any of my classes. In addition, I made many lifelong acquaintances, some of whom I am still in contact with today.

    One of our biggest events was the 25th Anniversary of the building when we had a big celebration and Willard’s widow came for the event.

    Needless to say, Willard Straight Hall is among my best memories of Cornell,
    Otto Frank Richter, ’52

    • 1952

      Otto, I was in charge of that 25th anniversary. A real highlight for me. Also meeting you and Dief (James Diefenderfer.) I agree, I learned sooooooo much being on the board there. We had great staff leadership and Foster Coffin even came to my wedding. Great, great memories.
      Harriette Scannell Morgan ’52.

  12. 1976

    One of my fondest Straight memories is the ritual of spending all study week in the M-Room, often sleeping there in a chair or on the floor, to “review” course work before finals.

  13. 1983

    This is an amazing story! My roommate introduced me to my husband my second day on campus on the steps of the Straight almost 40 years ago. We’ve been married for 35 years. I have lots of fond memories of WSH. I remember people gathered around to watch Luke & Laura drama on General Hospital in the afternoons and I still have items I purchased at craft fairs there. My first taste of Thousand Island dressing was on a Straight Burger! (I wonder if they still make those?)

    • 1980

      Thanks for all the great memories! I worked at the Straight freshman year, flipping Straight Burgers and applying the extras and dressings. Later, during my senior year, I returned to work for the director of the Straight as Big Red Barn supervisor (BRB was administered by WSH in those days.) So many great times as described in all these letters – food, naps, shows, social life, music, activism! A crown jewel at Cornell!

  14. Class of '60

    Who knew that Willard Straight Hall had an arts and crafts shop – and that one of the world’s first aluminum cans was fabricated there?

    I have fond memories of Willard Straight Hall that go back to my freshman year, ’56, when I attended an evening performance of the Firehouse Five Dixieland band in the Ivy room. The trombone player was standing on one of the dining tables and his slide extended over my head. I love Dixieland – and I became a regular user of the many facilities available at Willard Straight Hall. But, it was five years later, during the summer of ’61, that I first discovered that Willard Straight Hall had an arts and craft shop for students. This facility turned out to be a surprising benefit to me.

    At the time, I was a fourth year undergraduate student in Engineering Physics and was fortunate to secure a summer job on campus as a lab assistant to Professor Raymond Bowers in the Department of Physics. One of the assignments he gave me was to acquire a thin walled aluminum container to ship a single crystal of sodium we had made in our lab to a nuclear testing facility in Canada. An aluminum soda can or a beer can would have been ideal – but they didn’t exist at the time. (Back then, we drank beer out of steel cans at Jim’s Place.) The machinists who worked in Department of Physics were unsuccessful in machining such a thin-walled container out of solid metal. Fortunately, a Home Economics student friend of mine, Mary Ann Tower, ’61, had secured a summer job supervising the craft shop in Willard Straight Hall. She suggested that I might be able to use a lathe in the craft shop to “spin” the container from a flat aluminum disk similar to the way others spun and slowly deformed aluminum disks into the shape of ash trays as a regular craft project. The technique worked after the second attempt and I proudly received my 15 minutes of fame from my associates in the Department of Physics.

    Thanks again Mary Ann and thanks to Willard Straight Hall.

  15. 1971

    I remember being in a room with a TV in the Straight in 1969, watching the first Vietnam War draft lottery. When the first (low) numbers were drawn, it was easy to see but hard to watch a student in the room hearing his birthday called out. The memory of these now-scared men cry, in public, in front of their friends and classmates, still haunts me.

    • 1972

      I was in that room, too. #1 was just a day away from my own birthday. Continued sweating out the early numbers, and being “saved” by a high number. No one who was there will ever forget.

  16. Graduate School. Comparative Literature

    Raul Rodriguez-Hernandez says:
    The Willard was my refuge on harsh winters. As a graduate student, I spent days and nights reading endless works by Heidegger and Nietzsche. Now, even after so many years, I still can conjure up the aroma of coffee emanating from the Willard’s cafeteria.

  17. MS 1982

    WSH was an escape cafeteria in nights in which study at school offices went deep into the night. A late night hot chocolate was miraculous in keeping us awake. Thanks WS.

  18. I met my wife in the lobby of the Straight in 1967. Fifty years later at my reunion we went back to the spot where it all began. Nothing had changed except the cushions on the seats. The Straight stands as a symbol of our marriage and will always carry a place in our hearts.

  19. '79 MBA '80

    Among the more recent memories was the delivery of new college and university banners to the Memorial Room – a gift of the alumni of Sigma Phi Society. On September 11, 2009 — a somber day for all — the alumni gathered on campus for their third all-alumni reunion. I had the honor to present these banners (which replaced the banners we gifted at our Centennial in 1990) to Cornell. My reflections on this meaningful occasion are attached.

  20. ILR '59 Law '63

    While in the Law School I had the good fortune to serve as the manager of the Browsing Library. My supervisor was Mary Moore. It was she, I believe, who was concerned about the low usage of the library.

    It was incredible good luck that the woman in Day Hall working to find students employment on campus (wish I could recall her name) sent Virginia VanWynen ’63 to the Browsing Library for a job. I recognized her immediately as the sister of Joel K. Van Wynen. Joel was also a student in the Law School and former oarsman on the Crew.

    Virginia soon became my right hand in the library. It was a life-changing event for both of us. Ultimately, Virginia became the New York Times Librarian of the Year while at that time she was a Russian language major in the Arts School.

    Each month Virginia created a lovely, themed display for the front table of the library. The displays were so attractive that they brought more students in the doors to explore the contents of our library. She was also instrumental, along with Joan Travers and other staff, in changing the role of the library from a passive reading room into a lending source for records. For a small fee, students could borrow any record for a few days. The fees collected became the budget for the next month’s record purchases. So our lending collection was constantly expanding and bringing more and more students into our library where they could also enjoy the quiet for study or relaxation. Of course, one place the records could be enjoyed was the adjacent Music Room. (No thought was ever given to the Copyright laws.)

    Another change in the Library was the renovation of all the beautifully executed sailing ship models atop the library shelves. They were all cleaned and refurbished by the husband of the Straight’s secretary. (Their names also regrettably have escaped me.) Virginia’s and Joan Travers’ enthusiasm for the library was palpable and brought new, vigorous life to the library. And when I graduated Virginia took my place.

    Virginia changed my life also. I was living in a rented, basement apartment in Collegetown. As our first year was drawing to a close she noted that her sister was returning to campus for the summer session. Was I interested in sub-letting my pad to her sister and her roommate for the summer? Yup, Jane Van Waynen ’61 rented my apartment for the summer while I roamed New York State for the Ag Ec Department doing surveys for Professor Metz and his assistant Doug Dalryimple (sic). Jane and I married in 1965 fully as a result of Virginia’s handiwork.

    Of course, there is much more to be told in related stories but Jane and I are still married and now live in Rochester, Mn. while Virginia is retired as a nationally known librarian from the Library in Princeton, NJ.

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