Dartmouth College, Hanover, New Hampshire

When I was a kid I used to go up to Dartmouth now and then with my mother (she transferred there as a sophomore the first year it went co-ed), and because it's the first college I ever became familiar with it's in my head as sort of the gold standard in college campuses. It's beautiful, it's old, it's self-contained, it's green in summer and very very cold in winter, and it's located in Hanover, the quaintest little college town you ever did see. I ended up going to Bard, which is in the middle of the woods instead of a town and is more architecturally eclectic, but otherwise fits the Dartmouth template (campuswise, that is; the students are a little different...).


A little historical background: Dartmouth was founded in 1769 by Reverand Eleazar Wheelock for the purposes of educating, according to the charter granted by King George III to the Royal Province of New Hampshire, the "Youth of the Indian Tribes in this Land ... and also of English Youth and any others." To this day the college actively recruits Native American students and seeks to educate them in issues specific to their tribes and communities. According to the Dartmouth website, over 700 Native Americans have graduated from the college since 1970, more than from all other Ivy League schools combined.

The building pictured above (I happen to really like this picture; the sky broke open about 30 seconds after it was taken) is called Dartmouth Hall. It was the first -- and for forty years, the only -- building of the college. The original Dartmouth Hall was built in 1784, but it burned down and was rebuilt twice before the present version was completed in 1906. This one is made of brick, not wood (odd that it took more than one fire to affect that change), and two of its windows and the exterior hardware are originals from the first Dartmouth Hall. Today it houses the French, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese and German departments.

The building on the left is Wilson Hall. It went up in 1885 and functioned as the college library until 1928, when the Baker Library (see below) was built. The eponymous Wilson was George F. Wilson of Providence, who also donated a Wilson Hall to Brown University. Its distinctive towers served as book stacks and reading rooms, and in the eaves above the stacks contained the Picture Gallery. Today, Wilson is used as the headquarters for the Dartmouth Film Society, administrative offices of the Hopkins Center (the student center, located a few paces away) and the Film and Television Studies Department.

The Fisher Ames Baker Library was financed by George Baker, founder of what became Citibank (which means he's rolling in his grave right about now), and named for his uncle. Baker was closed for the Fourth of July while I was there, which is unfortunate because I desperately wanted to go in and see the Orozco Murals inside, which are massive beautiful expressionist masterpieces. And now that I'm reading about it I'm learning that there's something inside called the Treasure Room. THE TREASURE ROOM. I don't know what's in it (other than treasures). I wish I could have gone to the Treasure Room.

Well, that's all for today. Keep reading/start reading. Next I'll have some cool old buildings from Harlem.

NOTE: I've learned that the Hopkins Center is actually the performing arts center, not the student center. Apologies to all, and thank you to Peter Smith for the correction!