Hidden Spaces: The tower classrooms
Hidden Spaces is part of a series about lesser-known spaces at Harvard. In the fall of 1902, hatchet-wielding prohibitionist Carrie Nation brought her ire against tobacco and alcohol to Harvard’s Memorial Hall, where many undergraduates took their meals. The ham there was sometimes served with Champagne sauce, she had heard, and the jelly could be wine jelly. Nation shouted from the balcony, “Boys! Don’t eat that infernal stuff. It’s poison.” Afterwards, a 1932 Crimson story recounted, “She ran about slapping faces, seizing cigars and pipes, and crying that everyone at Harvard was a hellion. The students enjoyed every bit of it. …” Memorial Hall began more quietly. It was dedicated in 1874 to commemorate Harvard men who died for the Union in the Civil War. Its designers, New York architects William Robert Ware, Class of 1852, and Henry Van Brunt, Class of 1854, said they were inspired by the look of European...