The war also led to new extracurriculars that lasted beyond the period of hostilities. The Harvard Forum, a "wartime organization with peacetime objectives," continued to meet and attempted to "stimulate student opinion" well into the peacetime era.

Formal football games sprung up again, and the Crimson faced the University of Connecticut in its first official game since 1942, winning 7-0. The band and the big drum also appeared after a long period of dormancy, and the cheerleaders were on the field again. The crowds were still at wartime levels, though, when informal play was the only option for diehard football fans.

The undergraduates on campus were a very different group from the usual population: Since many students were already well into their adult lives, they tended to be "more mature and motivated," Lewis says.

Daily Life

In the University Theatre, Walt Disney's "Pinocchio" and the "Ziegfeld Follies" were playing. A yearlong subscription to The Crimson was $1.50, and a versatile men's suit was $40. Life after the war was prosperous for many.

The first contact lenses, called "invisible eyeglasses" were introduced. New magazines and banks offered special deals for student veterans.

Workers from the Whiting dairy hand-delivered milk to the new housing for married veterans. The janitor of Claverly Hall wore a jaunty bowler hat.

Meanwhile, the Associated Press was reporting the U.S. loan of millions of dollars to Poland, the battles between guards and Alcatraz prisoners and the expiration of the draft act.

The Rhodes Scholarship was offered again; and as a courtesy to veterans, the selection committee relaxed its rules by allowing married students and those up to 32 years of age to apply.

The reading room of Widener became all-male once again, as Radcliffe students were moved to a room in Memorial Church.

Classes returned, at least for a brief time, to an all-male makeup. Radcliffe students, who had taken classes with Harvard students during the war, were again excluded during the summer term of 1946, as enrollments skyrocketed and professors struggled to accommodate the overwhelming numbers.

Science classes, easily the most popular during wartime, were replaced by the introductory social science classes of Economics A and Government 1. History 5 jumped 125 percent in enrollment in one year alone.

The higher-than-expected enrollment in the social sciences led students to crowd through Boylston and Widener Libraries looking for course books.