Documents – Forty Years: The History of Women at Bowdoin

Student Council Social Rules Committee Questionnaire

Through this questionnaire (Document AW, 43), which was distributed to 300 students before the 1966 fall semester, the Student Council Social Rules Committee investigated student attitudes towards the College’s existing parietal rules, particularly as they pertained to women visitors on the then-all-male campus. The Social Rules Committee intended to take student responses to the questionnaire under advisory as it determined the future of parietal rules on campus—that is, those in loco parentis restrictions that fulfilled the College’s perceived “obligation to provide a moral environment” for its students (Peril, 174).

The questions reveal the existing dormitory and fraternity house social rules (which differed slightly from one another), as well as the College’s tendency to solicit student input before making broad policy decisions, which continues to this day. Women visitors were allowed in common living areas in fraternity houses and dormitories, although they were require to have “approved chaperones.”

Bowdoin’s campus rules at the time were slightly more strict than those of some other all-male institutions. For example, at Columbia University, women visitors were allowed in male students’ bedrooms without chaperones “on alternate Sundays, as long as the door was left open the ‘width of a book,’ which at least one student interpreted as the width of a matchbook” (Peril, 171).

After coeducation, Bowdoin relaxed its campus social rules tremendously. Trustee Ellen Schuman ’76, recalls that at Bowdoin, unlike at some peer schools that had different curfews for men and women students, “both men and women had equal stature in terms of their rights and responsibilities on campus.” (Trustee Focus Group, 3:20-3:54)

Works Cited:
Peril, Lynn. College Girls: Bluestockings, Sex Kittens, and Coeds, Then and Now. New York: Norton, 2006.

AW43 Page 1 - Student Council Social Rules Committee Questionnaire

AW43 Page 2 - Student Council Social Rules Committee Questionnaire

Speech to the Alumni Council and Letter from A. LeRoy Greason and Letter from LeRoy Greason to Peter Hayes

Early discussions about the possibility of coeducation at Bowdoin occurred on a number of levels: in faculty and trustee meetings; in the Student Council; and between students, alumni, and staff in a variety of formats.

In this February 1968 speech given at a meeting of the Alumni Council (Document AW, 44.1), Student Council President Peter F. Hayes ’68 addresses the “state of the College”—particularly how the College should approach attracting new students and faculty members in the face of mounting financial pressures. He considers the question of coeducation, which he estimates that “probably two-thirds” of the student body supports “on principle.”

Hayes argues, however, that “with near unanimity, those men who favor coeducation here favor a coordinate woman’s college,” rather than a coeducational Bowdoin, and urges the Alumni Council, moving forward, not “to do what is expedient rather than what is best.” That is, it would be expedient to enroll women at Bowdoin, but it would be best to establish a coordinate women’s college nearby.

Although Hayes’ opinion cannot be taken as representative of all Bowdoin students, his role as Student Council President suggests that he is obligated to represent the dominant sentiment on campus in his remarks.

Hayes forwarded his speech to A. LeRoy Greason, who was then the Dean of the College, and who would later become the president, with a request for feedback (Document AW, 44.2). Greason responded that he was “open on the coeducation question,” although he was not, at the time, particularly committed to pursuing coeducation. The College, Greason writes, “would lose a great deal” if fewer men were admitted to make room for women students.

This correspondence illuminates one of many campus attitudes toward coeducation in the years leading to women’s official matriculation at the College. Although Hayes and Greason were by no means the only people on campus who were not enthusiastic about the idea of a coeducational Bowdoin, their attitudes are particularly important to consider, as both were representatives of administrative bodies that shaped student life outside of the classroom. Even though Hayes had graduated by the time the College admitted its first full class of female students, a reluctant Student Council or Office of the Dean of Students could set the tone on campus towards these newly-matriculated women, and present difficulties both inside and outside of the classroom.

AW44.1 Page 1 - Speech to the Alumni Council and Letter from A. LeRoy Greason

AW44.1 Page 2 - Speech to the Alumni Council and Letter from A. LeRoy Greason

AW44.2 Page 1 - Letter from LeRoy Greason to Peter Hayes

AW44.2 Page 2 - Letter from LeRoy Greason to Peter Hayes

Orient: Beta Girls at Home, Brookie Trust Busted

Prior to coeducation, Bowdoin men often socialized with women from Westbrook College, located in Portland, Maine. The Westbrook women, known as Brookies, were not always well respected, and Westbrook College was given negative labels that included “Bowdoin’s Bedroom.”

This article appeared in the October 9, 1972 issue of The Bowdoin Orient, Bowdoin’s weekly newspaper (Document SS, 46). It reflects the transitional period that the college was in, as Bowdoin men began to socialize less with women from the community and more with their female peers on campus. It describes the process of including four female pledges in the Beta Theta Pi house, “a traditionally jockish fraternity.” The women rejected claims and rumors that the Betas were unwelcoming towards Bowdoin women. The Orient quotes the women saying, “‘the people are great,’ [they]‘feel at home,’ and [the men are] ‘really nice.’”

The article also details the feelings the four pledges had about the Brookies. There was certainly the potential for conflict, as Bowdoin’s female students were searching for their place on campus and the Brookies were Bowdoin men’s traditional social. The Bowdoin women’s responses ranged from stating that the Brookies presence did not matter, to saying that the Brookies were their equals, to dismissing the Brookies. One woman chose not to comment. These responses show that the early Bowdoin women faced numerous challenges in the Bowdoin social scene.