Dorm Sweet Dorm

1770

Eleazar Wheelock's first students build a primitive log hut for Dartmouth's first president and the women in his family. The students, along with Wheelock's sons, sleep on hemlock boughs in lean-to shelters.

1771

Construction is completed on a twostory all-purpose building located on what is now the southeast corner of the Green. Eighty students quarter themselves in 16 cold, dark, and dirty rooms. Fireplaces are the only source of heat. In violation of College rules, students chop their firewood indoors.

1822

Students living in College buildings are required "to abstain from all loud conversation, singing, playing on musical instruments, and from all other noise which may tend to interrupt."

1828

Students in Dartmouth Hall are not likely to oversleep; by day their dorm rooms become classrooms.

1843

A sophomore feasts on stolen fowl in his room. Included in the litany of crimes that eventually get him expelled are carrying a loaded gun, keeping alcohol, and fattening chickens in the dormitory.

1846

Many students move out of their filthy, bug-infested rooms and establish themselves off campus. The administration charges them rent anyway. The students riot, smashing windows and destroying College property.

1904

Indoor plumbing comes to Thornton and Wentworth Halls. Room rents jump by $15 per term. Alumni complain that the students are being coddled.

1916

Rent for a double room in Fayerweather Hall costs $140 a year.

1920

A housing shortage helps inspire admissions officers to institute the nation's first selective admissions. Candidates are ranked; those above 600 are urged to matriculate elsewhere.

1930

With the completion of seven dormitories and the remodeling of four others, the campus can accommodate 1,658 students.

1938

A popular pastime for freshmen living in Crosby Hall is trapping rats.

1951

Mail is no longer delivered to individual rooms.

1952

College employees stop making students' beds, saving an estimated $35,000 per year.

1969

Small private refrigerators are permitted. On the other hand, College guidelines still forbid "eating on a regular basis in dorm rooms."

1975

The Hanover Inn Motor Lodge becomes "temporary" student housing. The building will be used for this purpose for another 16 years.

1989

Russell Sage and Butterfield Halls are connected by a lounge and kitchen area known as "The Hyphen."

1990

Carpeted common lounges in most dormitories contain a large-screen TV, VCR, kitchen area with refrigerator and microwave oven, and videogame machines. Room rents average $2,829 per year.

In 1991 the Office of Residential Lifecan brag about the "fin de siecle oakwoodwork and wide brick hallways" ofWheeler Hall. But few students throughDartmouth history ever had it so good.