WOMEN'S DORM

Pop Can Tag

For a few years there was a pop can collection making the rounds of the women's dorm. There were several dozen cans. How you would acquire them varied, but usually a wall of pop cans would be stacked and tilted against your door.  Upon opening your door in the morning, you would be buried in cans.  The collection then became yours until you decided to hand it down to the next victim.

Louise Clark is pictured here, carefully positioning a doorway of the pop cans.

In the spring of '78, two Southview residents came in possession of the can collection. (Southview was the house for junior and senior girls, across from the Women's Dorm.)  It's not clear how the Southview residents came by the pop cans (better not to ask).  It was finals time - very hectic, everyone very stressed.  Some fun was needed to balance things out. Wanting to do something different, the Southview girls decided to hang them at night in the dining room, so that when everyone came in for breakfast there would be dozens of pop cans hanging from the ceiling. 

The ground floor dining room in the Women's Dorm was available for girls to study late at night.  During finals, bread and peanut butter were left out (thank you kitchen staff).  So the dining room would typically have a few girls studying past midnight. The residents of Southview would be back in their own house by that time, so the girls waiting to hang the pop cans had to keep watch from outside.

That was a different time in the world, and it was not unusual or unsafe for the dining room windows to be left slightly open, for ventilation on those warm, late-spring days.  (It is also possible that earlier in the evening the Southview girls removed a screen from a window in the ground floor dining room.)  In any case, by about 2:30 a.m. the way was clear.  The two girls headed across the street from Southview with the garbage bags of cans.  Getting quietly into the dining room with that clattering bag was a bit of a trick, but it was managed without raising an alarm.

Right away, there was a problem with the plan. Pop cans at that time did not have a ring that stayed on the can, and no ridges.  Tying string to the cans wasn't working; the cans slipped out. So they taped the string to the top of the can. Standing on the tables, they then tied the other end of the string onto the ceiling tile supports.

After they had about 15 cans hung, it was beginning to look quite festive.

Then the first can fell.  The dining room had hard table tops, and the polished concrete floor. No carpet, no table cloths.  When the pop can fell it clattered as it bounced numerous times on the table, then onto the floor where it bounced several more times before rolling away.

That sound in the middle of the completely quiet night rang out like a cannon.  The girls froze, and waited.  They didn't hear any steps pounding down the stairs.  Breathing a sigh of relief, they resumed work.

About 3 minutes later, the next can fell.  And then they realized.  All the cans were going to fall.  And this time, they did hear footsteps heading down the stairs. They made an immediate decision - leave the cans and run for it, propping up the screen behind them.

They made it as far as the ditch in front of Southview when they looked back and saw someone in the dining room.  They dropped flat into the ditch to avoid being seen.  For there they could hear, every 3 minutes, the next can falling. And they could see lights coming on in the dorm.

They stayed there in the ditch until the last can fell, laughing quietly and hysterically.  They knew no one would believe they hadn't planned for the falling cans.  But in this one case, at least, they could be considered to be innocent, or at least not completely guilty. 

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Southview Stories

Officially, there were 10 residents of Southview in the spring of 1978. There were actually 12. 

College life can be rough around exam time. Fritz was rescued from more than one death-defying situation, including the harrowing predicament seen below, and a near-flushing.

The teddy bear Disneygribble attended a senior chapel and managed to acquire an infraction.  He was also held for ransom by Greg Morris and Dave Schweigert, the terms announced from the speaker system of Greg's car, demanding that Southview turn over all snacks or else. 

Despite the threats, no harm came to any stuffed animals as a result of college pranks.