I really enjoyed this event! I learnt a lot of things about Cornell and West Campus that I didn’t know before from listening to Professor Blalock. I especially found his story about Ezra Cornell fascinating. He was a farmer and he only went to school up until grade 3. But when he got into the telegraphing business he made a word for himself and became successful. And now his legacy lives on through Cornell.

Cornell, and especially West Campus have changed a lot throughout the years. The first building on West Campus was Founders Hall and the newest building Rose main. For a long time, housing on Cornell was not seen as very important, and the men were all living off-campus. The women, on the other hand, were seen as more delicate and in order to protect them even more, they lived on campus. Slowly, there was a shift though and residential housing began to be built on campus. All the freshmen live on North campus, but there wasn’t really a place for upperclassmen to go unless they wanted to live off-campus or join a fraternity or sorority. And that is why West is so important, because it offers a community for upperclassmen on campus.

What stood out to me during the event was the visit to the War Memorial room in Lyon Hall. I actually had no idea that the room was even there before this tour! Unfortunately, it has to stay locked nowadays because there used to be too much vandalism there. It was the secret society Quill and Dagger that raised the money to build the whole war memorial. And they still have their receptions at the very top of Lyon Hall. Apparently, the only elevator in all of the Gothic buildings on West is the elevator up to their secret room.

Below are some pictures of the War Memorial room:

After the tour, we all went to Professor Blalock’s apartment and has sushi and desserts. He has a cute little dog whose name is Pepper and before the reception, when we were walking in the tunnel between Becker and Rose, he could hear us and started barking loudly.