The Faculty refused to close the College on ten legal Monday holidays declared by Washington to conserve fuel. The deans of New England colleges met on February 9 with federal officials to dissuade them from plans to completely close all colleges.

About 75 Harvard students spent their vacations cutting wood at Sandwich and Waltham to help ease the fuel shortage. Government experts spoke in Sanders Theatre on food conservation, and complaints about the meals served in Mem Hall and the Student Union lost much of their traditional passion.

Harvard football suffered a great loss to the war in Europe. Percy Haughton '99, the winningest coach in Crimson history, left for the battle-field in 1917--taking along all of his assistant coaches, By November, all 73 varsity lettermen were gone. As a result, there were no versity football teams in '17 or '18, though Wingate Rollins '16 organized and coached an informal team.

The Informals played seven games in the autumn of 1917, winning the first three, tieing the next three, and losing the last one. After opening the season with a 37-0 win over Dean Academy at Franklin, the Informals beat Bumpkin Naval Reserves 35-0 at Soldiers Field an the First Marine Heavy Artillery in the Stadium, 13-0.

Harvard's only loss came at the hands of "Cupid" Black, a former Yale star, who led the Newport Naval Reserves to a 14-0 romp over the Informals. Charley Barret, Cornell's All-American triple- threat quarter-back of 1915, left the Crimson defense in tatters.

The highlight of the 1917 season came on November 3, when the Army from Camp Devens met the Navy Yard in a championship contest in the Stadium following a 6500-man military parade. H. T. Enwright '19 paced the Ensigns to a 28-0 victory before 20,000 fans.

Other sports had an equally rough time in the autumn of 1917. The CRIMSON found need to lend a somewhat morbid justification to the national pastime: "We are living in a period of universal sadness and a tonic like the World Series is a good thing. It is indeed a case of 'making merry, for tomorrow we die'"

In January 1918, the Harvard Coop reported that the war had brought a loss of $56,427.90 for a six-month period over that of the previous year. Most of the loss came in the textbook and furniture departments. Coop membership, which did not yet include a plastic credit card, fell 900.

Not all business suffered because of the war. James W. Brine Company, local sporting goods store, advertised "Army supplies required by ROTC, Navy supplies required by the Radio School." The Collegiate Balloon School, Inc. of Rockville, Conn., searched Harvard for balloon pilots for the Army Signal Corps. Instead of Evelyn Wood's speed-reading program, undergraduates turned to General Wood's "Military Science Instruction Charts" to improve their grades.

Untroubled by modern cancer research, many undergraduates smoked Murads, "the Turkish cigarette." Crisp Arrow collars did a brisk business around the Square at 20 cents each, two for 35 cents, three for 50 cents. Max Keezer proclaimed "Old clothes wanted--will call at your room day or evening at your pleasure."

As if the Coop's business problems were not enough, on May 12 a fire broke out in the tailor shop at the rear of the third floor. The Cambridge Fire Department failed to respond to the first alarm, and the blaze gutted the entire third floor before it could be brought under control.

In February, a similarly unattended fire swept through Harvard's Dane Hall, destroying ROTC exams and valuable student records. By March, the University decided to raze what remained of the structure and plant the plot with grass.

As Commencement Day approached, the Class of 1918 renewed its enthusiasm for the war, which seemed to be turning against the Germans. On March 15, President Lowell called a student meeting to discuss wavs to prepare for the peace that seemed sure to come.

"I suppose that nobody doubts that we went into the war unprepared," Lowell told undergraduates. "Let us hope that when the war ends we will not be unprepared for peace." Twelve professors formed discussion groups precursors of the present student-faculty advisory committee--and several hundred students participated.

On March 30, ex-President Theodore Roosevelt '80 told a CRIMSON reporter that he advocated universal military training for all American males between 19 and 21. This brought renewed fervor for the war, and on May 2 President Lowell fired off a letter to the CRIMSON urging students not of age to stay out of the armed services.