<p>Vassar still serves tea too, everyday at 3PM in the Rose Parlor.</p>
<p>And then there is the Jane Fonda tea-related Vassar story …</p>
<p>“Rumor has it that when Jane Fonda was a student at Vassar, she arrived to tea one day improperly dressed. She was sent to her room and told to come back wearing the requisite gloves and pearls. When Ms. Fonda reappeared, she was wearing only the aforementioned gloves and pearls. Other versions of the tale include Ms. Fonda riding a motorcycle through the halls of Main Building in this outfit as revenge. Alas, this story has no basis in reality.”</p>
<p>My sister was class of ‘65 at Smith and I don’t remember her ever mentionning it. I’m curious now and will ask her. I know that both of us completely identified with Mona Lisa Smile, but it wasn’t so much our women’s college education as it was our girls’ private secondary school experience…the music, the stained glass, the (real) wood panelling. We sang several of the pieces that were featured in that movie.</p>
<p>My ds#2 signed up for netflix (on my credit card!) as a gift to DH for fathers day (first month was free-- then it his my credit card)! Anyway, now I can request these movies to watch and feel like I am gettign my money’s worth!
As an aside, why only wishing you’d met geezermom and jmmom? What did the rest of us do wrong? :(</p>
<p>I just asked my sister (Smith '65) and she said that it had to do with no gym clothes at dinner and tea on Friday afternoons, but that it was considered somewhat of a joke. She said it was taken pretty seriously in the 50’s, though.</p>
<p>I will jump in a bit late to say tea on Friday afternoons in the parlor, then there was the “beau” parlor, where gentlemen callers could be entertained on the main floor on Sunday afternoons only. I often handled the duties at the bell desk, as I enjoyed sorting the mail and seeing who got what in the mail. By the time I graduated, there were 24 hour parietals and one of my great joys as the Dorm President was getting to decide when the fire drills were. Invariably, I would make them at 2 a.m. so that I could see who was actually coming out of the dorms. ;)</p>
<p>I think I was in the last fraternity at U of M that had a house porter. He made our beds every day, changed the sheets once a week and cleaned our rooms once a week. This was in the early to mid 70s.</p>
<p>We had waiters for lunch and dinner. We also sang the doxology en masse on the way in to dinner every night.</p>
<p>Waiting to hear from the Fire Commissioner :), momof3, but in the meanwhile…
fire drills were big at Wellesley College. Reason being, as I a recall, that almost all of the college had burned down earlier in the century. We were trained to: bring (again as I recall) a towel, wear shoes and close the transom window above our dorm room door. What I really remember is that we were trained to bring a beloved possession so that we would not be tempted to run back in to retrieve something. Although I have never needed to use that piece of advice, I have always remembered it.</p>
<p>Middle of the night fire drills are the ones I remember. Because when we returned, we had ice cream sandwiches :D.</p>
<p>Yes, fire drills in the middle of the night at Wheaton, too, but our endowment wasn’t as big as Wellesley so no ice cream sandwiches afterwards. ha ha.</p>
<p>Christmas dinner at Wellesley was still pretty gracious in the late 70’s! Dress up, rock cornish game hens (my first experience with them!), plum pudding and all…</p>
<p>momof3sons,
If we hijack this thread a bit, we can discuss practical jokes/pranks we pulled in college. That would probably be entertaining! We could start a separate thread about that as well…</p>
