It was late in September 1926. Some 932 freshmen had just finished their first Registration, and many were moving into the new McKinlock Hall. The CRIMSON greeted the new class with a stiff word of warning: "The Class of 1930 are now students of Harvard University. Until they prove themselves to the contrary they so remain. And there are certain definite duties of the student at Harvard, invested as he is with the freedom of Harvard. He must be a gentleman. A gentleman respects tradition. And the traditions of Harvard are quiet traditions."

The traditions of Harvard may be quiet but they also must strong, for with the exception of a few changes of emphasis, many have survived the almost three decades that have passed since that September. Changes like the House system, Reading Period, and Lamont Library have transformed segments but the general tenor of undergraduate life remains. What the returning member of the Class of 1930 will probably notice most are not the changes, but the similarities between the present College and the one he remembers.

Football was much in the air that first fall. Dartmouth fell after a last minute 47-yard run by Arthur French '29, 16 to 12, but the Princeton game was something else again. The varsity not only absorbed a 12-0 defeat, but three stars, including Captain C. D. Coady, were put out of action for a week or more. The feeling among Harvard supporters that the men from Princeton weren't playing gentlemanly football was cited by the CRIMSON the following Monday, when it remarked that "there was evident animosity displayed within the Harvard Stadium last Saturday."

'Club Tables or Not?'

Another publication, the Lampoon, made matters worse with a cutting editorial. Many Princetonians were convinced that Harvard was chafing under the humiliation of recent athletic defeats and that the Crimson's apparently patronizing attitude had gone too far. Suddenly, on Armistice Day, athletic relations between the two universities were severed: Princeton Professor C. W. Kennedy wrote to Athletic Director William J. Bingham '16 that "Competition carried on in an atmosphere of suspicion and ill will of necessity falls short of the desirable objective of intercollegiate sports. Under these circumstances, we prefer to discontinue competition with Harvard altogether."

There was still a Yale game to go, but the varsity had lost its needed spark. The Crimson nevertheless came within two field goals, losing, 12 to 7. The Class of 1930, however, redeemed the season in part. The freshman team defeated the Elis for the first time in seven years, 19 to 7, behind the brilliant quarter-backing and running of Captain William T. Wetmore. His speedy backs, John Hitch and Guy C. Holbrook, Jr., also paced the victory with several good runs.

Those were the days before Houses and House dining halls, and the undergraduate ate wherever he could, in Square beanies, in clubs--almost anywhere. In December, President Lowell announced that "the Corporation has given me permission to go ahead with plans on a $100,000 dining hall, to be located on the old church site at Holyoke and Mt. Auburn Streets, but the Corporation does not intend to spend $100,000 to construct an empty hall. Do you men care for club tables or do you not?"

Board: $9.50 a Week

That May, he attempted to find just how many did care for club tables in the proposed dining hall by asking that 500 undergraduates pledge themselves to eat regularly there for about $9.50 a week. The petitions were started in the freshman dormitories, perhaps because the Class of 1930 wasn't yet set in its ways and would be more amenable to the new Hall. After more than two weeks, however, only some 200 had signed up, and Albert G. Hart '30 halted the petition on the grounds of inadequate response. The CRIMSON took up the drive for the hall by sending out 3000 pledge cards, still in the hope of receiving 500 back. Professor G. H. Edgell, Dean of the School of Architecture, praised the effort, and remarked that he didn't "know whether the new hall is more necessary for health or sociability. It is needed for both. It's success will depend, however, entirely on the students. It would be worse than useless to try and coerce or wheedle the students into lunching and dining like civilized beings."

Again the response was lethargic: only 125 pledge cards were returned, 85 coming from members of the Class of 1930. The attempt was abandoned for the time, with the CRIMSON commenting that it "remains firm in the belief that the custom of 'eating around' is on the decline. The proposal which it backed may not have been the correct one, it is obviously not the popular one." The undergraduate was set in his way and couldn't be made to engage in civilized eating.

The undergraduate wasn't very civilized toward the police that year, either. In mid-February, 39 students were arrested for alleged participation in a riot outside the University Theatre. A fight outside the theatre between two inebriated men, neither of whom were students, coincided with the theatre let-out. When police tried to lead the men away, the crowd rose to the occasion, jostled the officers and pushed a taxi to the sidewalk. One of the officers then pulled his pistol and held up the crowd until four paddy wagons arrived with 40 policemen, night sticks in hand, to dispatch the uprising.

The CRIMSON was furious the next day: "In the first place there was no riot until wagon loads of police charged the crowd with drawn night sticks, in answer to a summons for aid, not a riot call. The police, in other words, created a riot before quelling it." One student had been knocked unconscious for resisting arrest, apparently while in the act of going for a late snack in the Square.

The trial of the 39 arrested students was over all the front pages; even President Lowell attended in person. On March 2, 28 were acquitted and the remaining 11 were convicted of disturbing the peace. Four received ten-day jail sentences. The others paid various fines, which were termed "court expenses" when they all submitted a nolo contendere plea.

The winter had been unseasonably warm in spots and had prevented the freshman hockey team from playing either of its first two games. But 1930 had managed to trounce Andover, 7 to 0, in the first game it did play.

There was nothing to indicate at the time that Exeter would hand the freshman their first hockey defeat in four years, 2 to 1, early in February; perhaps it was the usual jinx, the exam time layoff. Yale had a good freshman team that year, a team that stopped 1930 at every turn and triumphed, 2-0. The "acrobatic" goal-tending of F. K. Trask was one of the few bright spots. The Eli freshman basketball team was equally as strong, and it trounced 1930 by an impressive 46-24 score.