In 1971, Derek C. Bok was appointed the University’s new president. Bok, a friend of Dunlop’s and a fellow Belmont resident, was reluctant to occupy 17 Quincy St. (now Loeb House), then the president’s official residence, for several reasons: construction of Pusey Library was underway, creating a large hole in the residence’s backyard, and, more importantly, student protests at the house had led to serious security concerns for Bok and his young family.
Aware of Bok’s reluctance, Dunlop offered Bok the use of Elmwood, provided that Dunlop could use at least the first floor of 17 Quincy St. for entertaining instead. Bok happily agreed.
And so it came to be, almost exactly two centuries after the original owner was forced from the building because of security concerns, Harvard’s president occupied the house because of security concerns.
The President’s House
Bok moved in 1971 and stayed for two decades at Elmwood until University President Neil L. Rudenstine took office in 1991. Rudenstine and his wife, Angelica Z. Rudenstine, loved the 12-room mansion, its wide lawns, guest house and carriage house.
“It’s not a fancy house,” he said. “It’s got wonderful proportions—and a sense of illumination and light about it that’s really wonderful.”
Angelica Rudenstine took to gardening in Elmwood’s flower beds.
“I think that spring is one of the really great memories because there are crocuses and there are daffodils and there are dogwoods and there are azaleas. They come out in quite a beautiful way. Angelica has done a great deal of that,” Neil Rudenstine said.
The house is considered Harvard property and is patrolled by the Harvard University Police Department (HUPD). At night, as HUPD officers drove the curving driveway and checked on Elmwood, Rudenstine would often come to the window and wave.
This July, after a brief cleaning and renovation, Summers assumed residence. Now, his tennis rackets grace the entryway and family photos hang throughout the house along with art from the University’s collection. The mansion’s library, now augmented by Bok, Rudenstine and Summers, still contains volumes from the Lowells’ original collection.
“I love it here,” Summers says. “I’m humbled by this building’s history.”
—Staff writer Garrett M. Graff can be reached at ggraff@fas.harvard.edu.
—Staff writer Andrew J. Miller can be reached at amiller@fas.harvard.edu.