The Green (Dartmouth College)

A view of the Green from its southwest corner.

The Green (formally the College Green) is a grass-covered field and common space at the center of the Ivy League campus of Dartmouth College in Hanover, New Hampshire, United States. It was among the first parcels of land obtained by the College upon its founding in 1769, and is the only creation of the eighteenth century remaining at the center of the campus. After being cleared of pine trees, it initially served as a pasture and later as an athletic field for College sporting events. Today, it is a central location for rallies, celebrations, and demonstrations, and serves as general, all-purpose recreation area. The College describes the Green as "historic" and as the "emotional center" of the institution.

Geography

File:Dartmouth College campus - diagram of the Green.jpg

A diagram of the Green, oriented with the top of the diagram at the north.

The Green is a five-acre (two-hectare) plot located in the center of downtown Hanover, New Hampshire. It is crossed by seven gravel walking paths. Three of them bisect the Green, running southwest to northeast, northwest to southeast, and east to west, respectively. The northernmost of its two east-west paths was added after Massachusetts Hall was constructed in 1907, and links the central entrance to that dormitory to the northern entrance to Dartmouth Hall. Two paths run from the northwest and southwest corners respectively to the middle of the Green's eastern edge. A final path runs north-south along the eastern side. The Green also has paved sidewalks along its southern and western edges.

The Green is not perfectly rectangular, as its southern border along Wheelock Street runs slightly to the northeast rather than due east-west. This irregularity is due to the Town of Hanover's 1873 seizure of part of the southeast corner of the Green, which it used to straighten Wheelock Street. The Green had previously extended 30 feet (9 meters) farther south on that corner.

The outside edges of the Green are bordered by benches and trees; two flagpoles stand at the center of the western side. The plot is bounded by four streets: Wheelock Street to the south, College Street to the east, Wentworth Street to the North, and Main Street to the west. All but Wheelock Street are one-way roads, with traffic circulating counter-clockwise around the Green.

Many of Dartmouth's important campus buildings are located around the Green. To the north lies Baker Memorial Library, Dartmouth's principal library, and Webster Hall, containing Rauner Special Collections Library. On the west side sits the administration building, Parkhurst Hall, the admissions building, McNutt Hall, and the student union, the Collis Center. To the south sits the Hanover Inn, a College-owned hotel, and the Hopkins Center for the Arts. To the east lies the historic Dartmouth Row buildings, composed Wentworth Hall, Dartmouth Hall, Thornton Hall, and Reed Hall, as well as Rollins Chapel.

History

An 1890 baseball game being played against Amherst College on the Green.

The land on which the Green sits was originally a pine forest, with some trees reaching the height of 270 feet (82 meters), high enough to block out the sun. The process of clearing the pines was begun in 1770 by the newly-founded Dartmouth College. The village plan of Hanover was laid out the following year and included as its central feature an open square of seven and a half acres. Even though the land had been cleared, many tree stumps remained; for its first sixty years of operation, it was a Dartmouth tradition for the graduating class to remove one stump.

The Green was not maintained at first; after being cleared, it was unkempt and ragged, sloping sharply towards a swamp in the southwest corner. The College debated as to the future of the plot, considering using it for a variety of purposes. In 1828, the Board of Trustees finally voted to plow, seed, level, and fence the area. Funding problems would delay this plan from being carried out until 1836.

Men carving canes while sitting on the Senior Fence.

One of the Green's earliest uses was as a pasture for cattle belonging to the residents of the town. Dartmouth students resented this use, and in the early 1800s herded all the cattle into the basement of Dartmouth Hall as a protest. The fence constructed during the 1836 renovations was in part a response to this action, and was meant to keep animals out. The fence thereafter became known as the "Senior Fence": only senior students were allowed to sit on it, and underclassmen in violation of this policy were soaked in a nearby watering trough. In 1893, when the fence's original purpose of keeping out livestock was no longer needed, the College decided to tear it down, to much student and alumni outcry. The class of 1893 restored and sponsored part of the fence, which today runs along the parts of the southern and western borders closest to the southwest corner.

In 1824, a Hanover ordinance permitted "the playing at ball or any game in which ball is used on the public common in front of Dartmouth College," which subsequently led to the Green becoming principally an athletic field. Cricket and old division football were among the games regularly played on the Green in the mid-1800s, and Dartmouth's first intercollegiate matches in baseball (1866), track and field (1875), football (1881), and tennis (1884) took place there.

Students playing old division football on the Green, 1874.

In 1906, the Board of Trustees voted to officially name the space "the College Green," which at the time also went by names such as "the College Square," "the Common," and "the Campus." Aside from minor changes in furnishing, vegetation, and crosspaths, the Green has remained largely unchanged since being cleared.

Uses

The 2007-2008 edition of Dartmouth's Student Handbook states that the Green is reserved "for informal use, including rallies and other assemblies, by students, faculty, staff, and guests of the College... and for a limited number of traditional events." Since other facilities have superseded its use as such (see List of Dartmouth College buildings), the Green is no longer used for official athletic competitions. Nevertheless, informal sports and games frequently occur on the Green. Like all of the Dartmouth campus, the entirety of the Green is Wi-Fi-enabled.

Rallies and protests

Given the Green's role as "the physical and emotional center of campus life," it is often the setting for protests, rallies, and demonstrations. Dartmo, an online directory of Dartmouth College's buildings, describes the Green as being "used any time when collective joy or frustration is to be expressed." Dartmouth's Student Handbook explicitly permits the Green to be used for demonstrations and rallies.

Students and community members rally on the Green for Democratic candidates in the 2008 Presidential election.

One of the earliest student demonstrations took place in 1814, when students gathered to celebrate Napoleon's defeat in Europe. At the height of the Vietnam War in the late 1960s, the Green regularly saw antiwar demonstrations, some attracting up to a thousand protesters. A 1969 protest on the Green led to the occupation of Parkhurst Hall, the College's administration building. In the 1986, students constructed shanties on the Green in favor of divestment from South Africa, a protest against Apartheid; staffers of the conservative newspaper The Dartmouth Review took sledgehammers to the structures. More recently, the Green was the location of a controversial 2006 May Day rally in favor in immigrant rights.

File:2004 Winter Carnival Sculpture.JPG

The 2004 Winter Carnival snow sculpture on the Green

On September 26, 2007, Dartmouth hosted a Democratic Presidential Candidates Debate. The Green was the site of student rallies in favor of various candidates, and also saw the live broadcast of Hardball with Chris Matthews.

Traditions and celebrations

Main article: Dartmouth College traditions

Dartmouth is well-known for its variety of long-standing student traditions, many of which are centered around the Green. At Homecoming each fall, a bonfire is constructed on the Green by the freshman class; students and community members gather to watch the freshmen run around it as it burns. The wintertime celebration of Winter Carnival sees the construction of a snow sculpture on the Green. In the springtime, Green Key Weekend is marked by concerts and performances on the Green, which until 1984 was also the site of fiercely competitive Green Key chariot races.

Other traditions involving the Green include the placement of a Christmas tree at the center each December and an annual Native American Pow-Wow. The College's commencement ceremonies are traditionally held on the Green, regardless of weather conditions.

Gallery

• 
  View from the north, from the tower of Baker Memorial Library
• 
  View from the southwest corner
• 
  View from the northeast corner
• 
  The Senior Fence
• 
  The flagpoles standing on the western side of the Green
• 
  The bonfire on the afternoon before Dartmouth Night in 2005, constructed at the center of the Green.
• 
  A military processional on the Green during World War I.
• 
  The Green, 1883.
• 
  The southeast corner of the Green, 1881.
• 
  An artistic rendering of the Green by a member of the class of 1807.

See also

• Quadrangle (architecture)

External links

• Webcam of the Green from Baker Tower