Despite the unfortunate weather, I thoroughly enjoyed Professor Garrick Blalock’s Behind the Scenes at Rose House tour this past weekend. From the history lesson about the university and the life of its founder, to the many features of Noyes, to the secret Quill and Dagger Society room and the War Memorial in Lyon Tower, it was a special experience. Perhaps the most fascinating part for me, however, was learning about the history of the West Campus House system, that led up to the revelation of the secret tunnel between Rose and Becker.

Standing outside the Becker dining hall, Professor Blalock explained to us the surprising fact that, at its conception, Cornell was designed to have had no dormitories at all, as the founders had thought them to be another way in which college students were isolated from the communities around them. Apparently, however, as time went on, the university realized it might be nice if the freshmen could all share a similar first-year experience through living in dorms with each other, and therefore North Campus was created. Further down the line, West Campus was created as well, but as it was not large enough to house the entire sophomore class, most students did not live there for more than a year, and it did not seem to serve a greater purpose than extra housing. The idea of the modern West Campus House system then was ultimately to create an environment that was able to foster a great sense of community with other students beyond freshman year and a tie to a residential place similar to that created by the residential college system at other universities. At the same, the capacity of West Campus was not expanded by very much, and so even as Cornell continued to move towards a dormitory school, much of the student population continues to live in the Ithaca community, as Ezra Cornell had wanted. To me West Campus seems like the right balance of the two important concepts of creating a strong academic community and engaging with the local population, which is just one more reason why Cornell is a truly an amazing and unique school.