Yes, Ron. It is delightful but not factual. I can speak from my pre-Army
fraternity experience at Berzerkely in 1943, my post army experience at the
same watering hole 1946-1948, and my law experience at Stanford where my law
review gang (and that included Sandra Day and Bill Rehnquist) were working
too hard to fit the pattern. However, the legendary Rosotti's and other
Stanford drinking holes more than sufficed for Stanford. In other words, the
academic arena writes good poetry and bad history. By the way, I think you
must have stumbled on some of the drinking spots, the fraternities, and the
campus excitement of the 1940's. I don't imagine you are that old, but I do
believe anyone around Berkeley knows the legends and the facts - both. Dick
B.

-----Original Message-----
From: Alcohol and Temperance History Group [mailto:[log in to unmask]]
On Behalf Of Ron Roizen
Sent: Thursday, February 12, 2004 1:12 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: history of drinking at college -- rusty memory

Beth -- Are you still there?

My file of alcohol-related FORTUNE articles turned up, and I'm afraid my
memory was less than trustworthy.

The article I was vaguely remembering, "Youth in College," appeared in the
June, 1936 (v. 13, starts at p. 99) issue of FORTUNE.  It provides an
engaging mini-ethnography of contemporary undergrad life, but offers,
unfortunately, not very much on drinking practices per se.

Still, what is offered is delightful.

Regarding male students:

p. 101:  "<Liquor and sex> used to be part of the great triumvirate of
campus topics that included religion.  Today economics is to the fore as
bull-session pabulum, with religion playing a minor role.  Liquor as a
conventional topic is passe.  Less flamboyant drinking is the present day
rule; there is no prohibition law to defy, hence one can drink in peace.
As for sex, it is, of course, still with us.  But the campus takes it more
casually that it did ten years ago.  Sex is no longer news.  And the fact
that it is no longer news is news."

p. 102, col. 1:  "At six o'clock an infinitesimal number of undergraduates
may serve cocktails (gin and lemon juice) in their rooms.  But the typical
student will go from his sports straight to dinner."

p. 102, col. 2:  "Between ten-thirty and twelve-thirty the campus subsides
into sleep.  A few independent drunks, who care little for the Friday or
Saturday night tradition, come roaring in at three, but the average
undergraduate doesn't get tight until classes and study are over for the
week.  Weekends are not so frequent as they used to be, the obvious reason
being that money has not been plentiful.  But one does not have to go far
away from college to drink.  The stages of college inebriation are ranked
as follows:  high, tight, looping, stinking, plastered, out.  Some would
put tight after looping.  But regardless of the grading of intermediate
philological degrees of drunkenness, most of the drinking undergraduates
think high is the desirable state of glow for a weekday night and even for
the ordinary weekend.  At spring house parties and at the football games
the student can proceed to the tight and looping (or looping and tight)
stages without causing any particular commotion."

There's more, on females, but nothing specifically on drinking -- unless I
missed it.

Ron