The Voice has been an establishment under many other names: from the College News in the early 1900s to Conn Census through the 1950s, to Sadyagraha, or “truth force,” for a short stint in the 1970s, settling into our familiar College Voice in 1977. We feel an alliance with all previous writers and editors of the newspaper at Connecticut College, and to declare solidarity with our previous entities have proclaimed ourselves Established in 1916, when the first class of women began writing their articles – longhand – and typsetting each issue.
For our last ten issues, we will spotlight the past ten decades at Connecticut College, through clippings from our newspapers and photos from our Archives.
Connecticut College in the 1920s was led primarily by Benjamin T. Marshall (1917-1928), an ordained Presbyterian pastor living, at the time, in Nichols House. This decade welcomed the construction of Vinal Cottage in 1922 (now the CELS house), built for cooperative living; Palmer Library in 1923 (now Blaustein Humanities Center); Colonial House in 1925 (now Knowlton House); and Holmes Hall (behind the Chapel) in 1928. In 1929, one Katharine Blunt, PhD in organic chemistry and dedicated to establishing Home Economics as a profession and science, moved into Unity House and became the College’s third president. Below are excerpts from the College News in the 1920s, amidst photos from the College Archives.
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November 11, 1920: Mud Slinging
Most of us do it,– in a mild form, sometime or another. It is not the violent kind of mud, the kid with rocks in it, to which I refer, but the kind that calls the other fellow down and thinks he is no good, and wonders “Where on earth Mary ever picked up that hat, it’s such a freak,” and “isn’t Bertha a perfect ‘nut’” and “did you ever in your life see such a screaming hair comb as Tillie’s?” Oh we all do it. There’s no getting around it. It is a well-known adage that all women are catty by nature. I don’t believe it. That is I don’t want to believe it.
March 11, 1921: Totem Pole Returns: Juniors and Sophomores Smoke the Pipe of Peace.
October 21, 1921: Juniors Entertain Freshmen at Stunt Party
Lemonade and wafers were served by dainty Japanese waitresses. Dancing was interspersed through the program. The party ended with a song to the Freshmen, and rousing cheers for the Juniors.
February 24, 1922: “What do you read?”
In recent questionnaires filled out by students of the Junior and Senior classes of Connecticut College concerning the reading of magazines, the following results were obtained in answer the questions listed […] What magazines do you like best? 
“The Atlantic Monthly” received the greatest number of votes as first choice and second choice; “The Saturday Evening Post,” third choice; the “Literary Digest,” “American,” and “Asia,” tied for fourth choice, and “Vanity Fair,” fifth choice.
May 5, 1922: “Prom Days—”
Prom days, prom days, anything but calm days, Special, and phone-call and telegram, Speeding to C. C. From The Man: “Sorry I can’t come up the 6th, Can’t get away—in an awful fix Sending my roommate up instead, Sweet disposition and hair brick red— Awfully good sport, I’m sure he’ll fall, Pretty fair dancer but that’s about all. Better luck next time, But I forgot to say How about our Prom The last of May?”
November 3, 1922:
There is a widespread movement among the colleges to decrease the quantity of the curriculum and increase the quality. Here at Connecticut, most of us take at least six subjects, and in our endeavor to keep them going and at the same time attend to the necessary non-academic affairs, we find that at the end of the day it is almost physically impossible to summon the energy to prepare for the next day… Are we at Connecticut in danger of becoming scholastic Jacks-of-all-trades, of doing a great many things and doing none of them well?
