Heavy rains and wind gusts of up to 50 miles per hour hit Harvard yesterday as storms swept across the Eastern Seaboard, causing minor damage to one University building and inconveniencing people all over campus.

High winds hit the four large front doors of William James Hall and damaged their closing mechanisms, according to Michael N. Lichten, the Faculty of Arts and Sciences' acting director for physical resources.

"The closers of the doors started breaking between 8 and 9 a.m.," said Herbert H. Fuller, building superintendent of William James Hall. "By noon, all four doors had broken. With large pieces of glass and steel flailing around, there's an incredible potential for injury."

"We had to lock [the doors]. Since you can't lock them from the inside, we had to put up warning tape," Fuller said. "The repairs commenced shortly after noon and were finished around 4:30."

Students interviewed yesterday were dispirited by the rain and sleet that persisted throughout the day.

"The weather reflects my mood of pre-last-week-of-school hell," said Catherine C. Darnton '95 of Adams House.

"I want some snow. I came from Texas to a school up North," said Pennypacker resident Amara Tandy '96. "We should have snow, not rain. I can have that back home."

But other students said they found something worth appreciating in the weather.

"One of the good things is that all this wind is really cool," said Eliot House resident Kenneth R. Winter '93.

"If it stays this windy at night, I might go down to the football field and run around naked in the storm," Winter said.

Many students and Cambridge residents flocked to the Coop to buy umbrellas to replace those damaged by the heavy winds.

"Umbrellas are selling about three or four times as quickly as they usually are," said Monica Ferr, a salesperson at the Coop's men's furnishings department.

The storm, which lashed the entire East Coast yesterday, left up to eight inches of snow in western parts of Massachusetts. Waves crashing over seawalls moved the coastal communities of Revere, Saugus, Quincy, Beverly, Winthrop and Nahant to declare states of emergency.

At Logan Airport, winds caused cancellations and delays of numerous flights.

The storm left nearly three feet of snow in parts of Pennsylvania. In New York City flooding caused the shutdown of subways as well as the Staten Island Ferry, stranding thousands of commuters (see related story, page 4).

This article was written with wire dispatches.