Topsy P. Turvy '76 walked out of his Mather House room perched atop the MBTA car barns and took the elevator down to the Boylston St. exit. As he headed up Boylston St. toward the Square, he passed by the 23-story "Brattle Motel" and continued his trek to a class in the International Studies Center located between Littauer and the Science Center.

Confused? You should be. It would be impossible to take the path followed by Turvy because it quite simply does not exist. The buildings were all planned, but for one reason or another they never made it past the drawing board.

This is the Harvard that never was, the Harvard that might have been. It is a story of false prophets, ill-conceived plans, ideas that fizzled.

Gore Or War

When asked on March 22, 1955, if Lowell House wanted some of Gore Hall, Master Elliott Perkins '23 said, "Such is our desire."

And so, the Gore tug-of-war was in full swing. Before it was over, Adams, Lowell, Leverett and Winthrop all wanted a piece of Gore, and they were ready to fight for it.

The incident began in November 1954 when Winthrop House Master Ronald M. Ferry '12 announced plans to join Gore and Standish Halls with a Georgian connection. Gore and Standish were then, as they are now, the two parts of Winthrop House.

Ferry's plan called for low-cost rooms and communal bathrooms to be built in the extension, making Winthrop a long, curved building with four wings jutting toward the river.

Leverett got into the act in March when Master Leigh Hoadley and the Leverett House Civic Improvement Society proposed a connection between Gore and McKinlock Halls. The new wing over Plympton St. would support a bell tower and include a tunnel for pedestrians, automobiles and a trolley. "If people are going to resist, we shall arm and march tomorrow," Arthur N. Schwarz '56, president of the Civic Society, said.

The next day, Winthrop tutors rejected Leverett's claims to Gore. "The proposed tower, resting upon a feeble arch, would be as shaky as are these fabricated claims," the tutors said.

Before a Masters meeting on March 23, 1955, some House mentors expressed interest in Gore, but only Dunster House Master Gordon M. Fair had anything worthwhile to say: "We don't want any of it."

No Go for Ho Jo

The gleaming orange and blue Howard Johnson's sign never made it to Brattle Square. Ho Jo's had intended to take over the management of a 23-story motel in Brattle Square, but negotiations fell through in June 1964.

The motel's architect was not dismayed by this turn of events. He continued to refine his skyscraper design, which he said would "blend in very well with the architecture of Harvard Square."

The 200-room motel was scheduled to be built at 104 Mt. Auburn St., where the Coolidge Bank and Trust is now located. The plans also called for a swimming pool, a restaurant and five floors of parking. In 1964, an Amoco service station occupied the site.