It was interesting to hear from Professor Blalock about the history behind West Campus housing and efforts by early Cornell administrators to distance itself from institutions like Harvard and Yale that provided education only for rich white protestant men. For example, Ezra Cornell did not want to have dorms on campus because he wanted students to interact with the local community (though there was a women’s dorm for “safety”). I was particularly struck by Prof. Blalock’s story about dorms at Yale that had smaller servant quarters attached to larger bedrooms that modern students now fight over. It makes me appreciate the motto of “any person, any study” a lot more and less ironically.

That said, our tour through the tunnels and the war memorial room was the more exciting part of the event, revealing the “secrets” of Rose House. My favorite part of the tour was hearing Professor Blalock’s stories about the part of the tunnel immediately under the House Professor’s apartment. Apparently the tunnel is a great spot to practice baseball but a terrible place to have discreet conversations, as the lack of sound insulation means everything is audible in his apartment. Other highlights included learning about the Quill and Dagger society and multiple doors screaming their protests at staying open too long.

At risk of sounding a little crazy, I’ll just add this in here- the basement system would work really well as the set to a horror movie/game or murder mystery. Dim the lights, put some grime or blood spatter  on the walls, and add some strategically placed messages and you’ve got quite an chilling atmosphere, complete with cheery and unsuspecting prospective victims milling around obliviously aboveground. If there are any amateur filmmakers here, well, there’s an idea. Be careful though, it may be easier to get down there, but it’s just a bit harder to get out…

Note: there doesn’t seem to be a category for this yet