According to the Oxford English Dictionary, Hazing is “a species of brutal horseplay practiced on freshmen at some American Colleges.” For nearly thirty years from the Pre-WWII era until the 1960’s, Wheaton College was no exception to this tradition. The rivalry between the incoming freshman and sophomore classes arose from parties thrown in the 1920’s to actually honor the freshman by the sophomores. In 1933 the Student Council approved “organized torture for the incoming classes.” The sophomore class would elect people to the “sophomore courts” which had the authority to summon freshman who were not following the rules. Punishment for failing to obey the regulations was originally twenty swats with a bare hand. However, as time went on, these punishments became less severe. Any freshman who did not participate in the system lost their privilege to be involved with class activities.

According to Freshman Hazing Rules listed in the Fall 1941 Record:

1. Dinks must be worn at all times except on Sunday and Friday evenings after 6:30 p.m.
2. Badges sold by the sophomore class must be worn at all times except Sunday and Friday evenings.
3. The following walks must not be used by freshman: between Williston and the Gym; between Williston and Blanchard; between Blanchard and the Gym; and the back entrance to the Stupe.
4. Keep off all grass on the entire campus.
5. At command “ATTENTION” given by a sophomore, the response is to simultaneously button with one hand and salute with the other and click the heels.
6. At command “BLITZKRIEG,” a white handkerchief knotted at each end, must be thrown in the air and caught on the head.
7. On Wednesdays, carry books in wastepaper basket. Boys will also carry whisk brooms and cloths to perform valet services for any upper classmen.
8. On Thursdays, both boys and girls must wear all clothes backwards, including dress shirts worn by boys. Walk backwards on campus. Girls’ hair must be in pigtails.
9. On Fridays, girls must wear one dress shoe with sock and one saddle shoe with stocking. Boys must wear clothes inside out, with one pant leg rolled to the knee.
10. On Saturdays, girls wear hair in curlers and war dresses and boys wear bow ties with crew neck shirts.

Carl Sandburg (1878-1967), Illinois poet laureate, collector of songs and Pulitzer Prize-winning Lincoln biographer, resided in Elmhurst, Illinois, from 1919-30, writing for several Windy City newspapers, notably the legendary Chicago Daily News. After three productive, happy decades living in Illinois and Michigan, he moved in 1945 with his family to North Carolina where his wife, Paula, raised award-winning goats on their farm, “Connemara.” There he continued writing poetry and his one novel, Remembrance Rock, in addition to traveling the country, playing his guitar and singing American ballads. Renowned as both felicitious wordsmith and exhaustive researcher, he was hired by 20th Century Fox in 1961 to work on the script for director George Stevens’s biblical epic, The Greatest Story Ever Told. (Stevens also directed The Diary of Ann Frank.) The film, released in 1965, features Max von Sydow, Angela Lansbury, Shelly Winters, John Wayne, Roddy McDowell, Charlton Heston, Donald Pleasence, Sidney Poitier and Telly Savalas – truly an “all star cast.”

While in Hollywood, Sandburg received an inquiry from a Mr. Wood, who evidently asked about the author’s relationship to Wheaton College. Typing on a sheet of “George Stevens Productions” letterhead, Sandburg responds on May 10, 1962: “Dear Mr. Wood: Along late in the coming autumn my schedule for 1962 will be in the making. When residing in Elmhurst I rode all around Wheaton on a bicycle and have an old neighborly feeling about Wheaton College. Sincerely, Carl Sandburg.”

Though Sandburg receives screen credit for “creative association,” his exact contribution to the project is not fully known. He received the job on the recommendation of Ray Bradbury, who declined the studio’s request that he write the script. Sandburg, born in Galesburg, Illinois, where Wheaton’s first president, Jonathan Blanchard, also served as president of Knox College, wrote in his autobiography, Always the Young Stranger, a rather unflattering portrait of the ever-crusading Blanchard, describing him as “…not one bigot but several.” He felt that Blanchard’s influence, which wasn’t cast in any positive sense, was present for decades after his departure, so much so that one could almost “catch the ghost of him.” To Sandburg Blanchard was the amalgam of a lion, bear and buffalo, and possibly half horse and half alligator!

Sandburg died in 1967. His ashes are interred beneath a boulder called “Remembrance Rock” in the backyard of his childhood home in Galesburg.

In January 1952, just after the opening of the Nicholas Library at Wheaton, Record report Hal Malehorn gave a short and informative history of books and the building that housed them. Below is Malehorn’s account:

Reporter Tells How a Library Outgrew a Building
By Hal Malehorn

With the exodus of the library from Blanchard hall comes a historic narrative–the story of a building and of books.

Back in 1860… the library as such was non-existent. The only texts were the private collections of the instructors.

Blanchard Hall began to grow in 1868. …Then old third floor Fischer library became the chapel, replete with green-upholstered pews. The classrooms clustered around the center section, now used by the business offices.

Right after this came the building of the Tower in 1871, Blanchard’s roof was raised to form the chapel room. In those days there were stairways on either side of the building, outside, And Pres. Jonathan Blanchard had letterheads printed even then with the drawing of Blanchard hall, exactly as it is now.

Third floor west end housed the girls. The boys’ “dorm” was on the floor above. There was even an elaborate elevator to haul coal, ashes and occasional enterprising individuals up and down. Winters were cold, and coal stoves were in vogue, and atomic solar heat was still some decades away.

The present physics lab was originally a large, well-kept parlor, while the chem. lab directly beneath it served as dining hail and kitchen until 1927, when another general shifting took place.

Loyal Celts and Belts held forth in what are now the first floor finance offices. Aels scheduled their society for the present biology lab.

Meanwhile, the library was growing. As books accumulated, a small room was reserved for them in the first floor center section; the music teacher was dismayed to find himself in charge of the room.
Several years later, the shelves transferred one floor up, and the books were moved en masse into what is now the registrar’s office.

1890 was an epic date for Wheaton. That was the year a great pipe organ was installed in capacious Fischer chapel. It was the first pipe organ in town, and Wheaton folks were rightly proud. As a result of this, the chapel had to be rearranged.

Opera chairs were installed, $1.25 apiece, the old green-upholstered pews migrated to various back yards and front porches, and some even lined the walls of the new library room. In 1890, too, central heating was installed in the basement, creating an audible hazard for the chapel worshipers up on third floor.

In addition to books, the new library room housed the book store, which was operated: by students until 1908, when the college took over.

By 1913 the college owned an amazing 10,000 volumes, all of which were arranged according to shelves A, B, C, section 1, 2, 3. Professor Rice had heard of a new-fangled Dewey decimal system, and so one summer he and three daughters, with a $600 stipend, catalogued the entire library. This was the beginning of the modern Wheaton college library.

1927 was another great year in the history of books and buildings. That was the year the final east addition was made. Included in the wing was the Frost reference library, into which many of the books were moved. It was not long, however, before the library was again bulging at the seams.

Consequently, in 1936 the stacks were removed from E201 and placed in the former Fischer chapel. This necessitated an entire reinforcement of the center section of Blanchard from the basement up. Two years later the final segment of stacks was added in Fischer.

Since 1938 Wheaton has experienced more growing pains. Enrollment doubled, the library grew and grew.

And then in 1950 came Pres. V. Raymond Edman’s announcement in chapel of the gift of the new library building. That library is now a reality.

This is the newest chapter in the story of buildings and books.

___________

[this image showed a “rendering” of the new Nicholas Library that appeared in the Tower]