Harvard University is steeped in tradition and legend – as a walking tour of the campus shows.
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Kissing the John Harvard Statue
One girl – of a suitable age to be a student here, but evidently not one – goes to kiss the foot of the John Harvard statue. Our guide takes us to one side, and divulges the key information. “You might not want to copy her, guys,” he says. “At the weekends, male students have this ritual called ‘going to the John’.”
Said ritual involves drinking rather a lot, climbing the statue and then… well, you can guess the rest. Let’s just say that Harvard University staff need to hose the statue down every couple of weeks. It’s good to know that future captains of industry, kings of the law courts and prominent politicians aren’t averse to the childish student prank.
Harvard alumni and tradition
Harvard is arguably the most famous university in the world. The alumni list includes eight US presidents, numerous Nobel prize winners and writers including Ralph Waldo Emerson, Margaret Atwood and Norman Mailer. It’s a placed steeped in tradition – and, more importantly, legend. And despite all the grand red brick buildings and statues on display, it’s the stories that make a visit to Harvard really fascinating.
Town vs gown in Cambridge, Massachusetts
The main Harvard campus is in Cambridge, Massachusetts. It’s effectively a large suburb of Boston, but the people of Cambridge hate being told that even more than they hate the students taking the place over. There’s quite a fierce town vs gown rivalry here, as the largely blue collar townsfolk are inundated for a large chunk of the year by largely rich and pampered blow-ins. The town just so happens to host two of the world’s most prestigious higher learning establishments – the Massachusetts Institute of Technology is on the other side from Harvard.
This scarcely concealed competition between the locals and the academics has led to absurd planning permission wars – one side forcing the other to come up with hundreds of alternative designs for fire stations and guard huts, at costs far higher than initially planned – and regular petty bickering.
Taking a walk through Cambridge is absorbing – student bars and working class bars sit uneasily next to each other, while away from the university buildings are sleeves-rolled-up garages.
Harvard tour guides
The contrast can be seen even in our two tour guides. One is local and rattles away with street smarts – “stand on the grass. Harvard can afford more grass” – the other is a slightly awkward architecture enthusiast who looks entirely at home in his straw boater.
Harvard has long been slightly starchy of collar. It was founded in 1636 as a place to train ministers, and was later renamed after John Harvard – an English clergyman who donated some books. In 1764, almost of all of these were destroyed in a fire and one student ‘saved’ one by surreptitiously sneaking it out of the library the night before. He got kicked out for it.
Female students at Harvard
Female students only started to receive the same diploma in 1999, while the graduating class of 2010 was the first to have more women than men. “This is something that Harvard women are very proud of, and Harvard men are very excited about” announces our gawkier guide.
It is the third wealthiest private institution in the world, after the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and the Catholic Church, but that still doesn’t stop people pouring in with donations. Most of these are blatantly for ego-massaging purposes.
The Titanic and the Widener Library
The Widener Library is a classic example – it was named after Harry Elkins Widener, a 1907 graduate who died on the Titanic. His mother donated millions for the library to be built but legend has it that she sneaked a few clauses into the contract to prevent it being renamed the moment someone richer came along. One was that the outer appearance couldn’t be altered in any way, or the ownership of the building would revert to the city of Cambridge. Understandably, given the town/ gown thing, the university has elected to just build miles of bookshelves in numerous underground storeys instead.
Rumours about Harvard
Other legends, such as the one about Harry’s mother insisting that all Harvard students pass a swimming test before they graduate so that Harry’s fate doesn’t befall others, turn out to be nothing but rumours that have gained credence over time. But there are so many of them that they become part of the attraction. Others include the idea that students would be allowed to rent original Picassos from the Harvard art museums to put in their dorm rooms, as long as they promised not to have a party.
But it’s the random encounters which make ambling around the Harvard Campus so enjoyable. For all the old stories, what makes the place are the post-grads sitting on child-like coloured chairs in the yard to eat their lunch, engineering students holding up a banner demanding a full enquiry into 9-11 and the street performers battling for attention with the protestors outside the train station. The prestige and the parables are more than matched by the people-watching.
