John T. Bushell ’54 says that there were two cafeterias on Mass. Ave. where he would spend time—the Waldorf and Hazen’s.

“[At the Waldorf] there were tables that weren’t very clean—very simple fare,” he says. “You could go and sit there and stay there as long as you wanted. A lot of writers sitting there having their eleventh coffee.”

Michael G. Eakin ’54 remembers that the cleanliness of a place had nothing to do with the taste of its food.

“A couple of greasy spoons–one that looked dirty was good and the one that was clean was bad,” he says, struggling to recollect their names.

Another inexpensive student favorite was Cronin’s, a bar on Dunster Street that William B. King ’54 described as “the quintessential Harvard hangout.”

“Cronin’s Bar was where many of us drank more than we should have,” says Wendell Perry ’54.

“They sold dimies—draft beer for a dime,” Corcoran says.

The bar was destroyed to make way for the Holyoke Center in 1965.

On the site where Alpha Omega now stands, a store called Varsity Liquors had no qualms about selling alcohol to those underage.

“We would always send our youngest looking classmate...to get the beer, [he was] barely 16 and looked around 12,” says Warren Markarian ’54.

THE LEFTOVERS

The stores that remain have had to adapt to the changing Square.

King, the chair of the Cambridge Historical Commission, recalls spending time with his then girlfriend (now wife) at a luncheon counter (now gone) at Leavitt and Peirce on Mass. Ave.

“I would meet my girlfriend at the counter where there were all sorts of faculty who would be regulars,” says King.

Sheila King ’54 recalled one regular who had particularly bizarre eating habits: “corn beef hash with an egg and a scoop of chocolate ice cream.”