
Campus life


Winter memories @ WSU

Down “The Drain” in the TUB
In the 1950s Patty Ernst and Marian Baldy Kenedy would pass time between classes at the TUB. The former women’s gymnasium, built in 1901, became the Temporary Union Building while a new student union was being built. A structure of many uses, it had also served as an ROTC armory, a bookstore, a bowling alley, and temporary housing for a surplus of students just after World War II.
Playing on the bath-like name, the building even had “The Drain,” a basement café and hangout filled with booths and a jukebox. Friday and Saturday night dances there were very popular, with more than half the student … » More …

The scoop on Ferdinand’s murals
Visible clouds of breath hang about as we all look upon what remains of the original murals of the Ferdinand’s ice cream shop once located in the now deserted Troy Hall.
The first home of the dairy department, Troy is in the middle of campus and in poor condition. Roped off for safety, this 1920s brick structure has been on the University’s capital planning list for renovation for a few years now. It is currently in the design stage of what is expected to be a $40 million renovation so that it can be a suitable home for environmental sciences and chemistry.
As rotting … » More …

Video: Campus shortcuts
A quick trip up and around the legendary hills of the WSU campus.
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Everyone could use a lift
It’s 9:58 a.m. and Josie Tarr is running late for her 10:10 digital storytelling class.
Getting off the bus in front of the new Northside Residence Hall, the digital technology and professional and technical writing double major sprints up the stairs between Bohler and the PE Building to get ahead of the crowds heading in the same direction: the CUB elevator.
Too late. She groans. A crowd of about 35 is already waiting.
Briefly considering her alternatives, both lengthy sets of stairs, one running up near the elevator structure and the other wrapping around it, the junior from Tacoma drops the idea as the weight … » More …

Video: How to say "Go Cougs" in sign language
Learn how to say "Go Cougs" in sign language through a video by WSU Global Campus.
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The original story of Nature Boy
Washington State University’s sculpture “The Reader” made its first appearance on campus in 1949. The Powwow, the college’s alumni magazine, carried the following story in 1949, which showed the mixed response to the large ornament dubbed “Nature Boy” by the students.
What’s New on the Campus?
by Bonnie Wamberg
November 1949, Washington State College PowwowCampus conversational piece de’ resistance this month concerned the 30-foot limestone figure which now adorns one corner of the new Ernest Holland Library. Student opinion and comment blew hot and cold, for and against the 40-ton ornament. Some say it is beautiful, … » More …
Booze, Sex, and Reality Check
Last August, before starting classes, before even really getting to explore campus, the 4,000-some members of the freshman class were required to take an hour-long clinic designed to improve their behaviors.
The Booze, Sex, and Reality Checks program came during the Week of Welcome. Amidst the moving in, concerts, picnics, and open houses, WSU’s new students ducked into cool classrooms for versions of a seminar on drinking and sex.
“We don’t normally have firsthand interaction with students,” says Leah Hyman, a human development graduate student who broke form to assist a WSU drug and alcohol counselor in the workshops. In a field rife with … » More …

An even playing field
Anyone who has negotiated the Pullman campus in winter will hardly be surprised that students dependent on wheelchairs tend not to select Washington State University. Only about five wheelchair-using students currently brave WSU’s hills. Among them is Svetlana Lockwood, a graduate student in computer science.
Lockwood, who has cerebral palsy, married a Pullman resident and moved here from Latvia. Her description of life in the former Soviet country illuminates a stark contrast.
Teachers there discouraged Lockwood’s parents from bothering to pursue further education for their daughter. She was largely confined to a third-floor apartment with no elevator. Even when she emerged, streets and sidewalks … » More …