Tardiness required suitable excuses or punishments were inevitable! This is report to the House Council in Barbara Wishmeyer's (the Dean of Women) Scrapbook for Zelda Clutch on January 4th, 1963. She was 5 minutes late on this Friday night for curfew because she had an argument with her date.

An article in a local newspaper documents the end of Dickinson College’s association with the national fraternity, Phi Mu. The article says that the Beta Delta Chapter of Phi Mu voted unanimously on September 25 to disassociate with the national organization, and the former chapter “will continue as a new local women’s fraternity, Alpha Delta Epsilon.” The article includes comments from Diane Obersheimer, Alpha Delta Epsilon’s president, Dean Gillespie, the Dean of Students, and Dickinson’s President, President Howard Rubendall.

 

The only foreign student at Dickinson during the 1962-3 year was Hsiao Mei Tsou from Singapore. She remarks in this article on the differences between America and Singapore, most notably that girls never talked to boys back home. Very studious, she works often in the library but wishes that it were open later, but finds the Dickinson students very helpful. In Singapore, about half of children go to school and even less complete post secondary education. Hsaio loves the United States and thinks she wants to stay after graduation.

On October 4, 1967, the President of the Beta Delta Chapter of Phi Mu writes a formal letter to the National President of the fraternity, Rebecca Peterson. The Beta Delta Chapter writes to inform Peterson that there has been a unanimous vote “to dissolve its ties with the national fraternity,” and become “locally autonomous in light of the difference of opinions concerning membership policies.”

 

"Suggestions Considered Requisite by the Students of Dickinson College For the Improvement of the College," labelled the "Atrocity Sheet Circulated by Dickinson Students" in Marion Bell's 1941-1946 Scrapbook lists many student complaints including those against Dickinson's food, service, and need for a President, but most notable are those against the Women's Dean, Dean Josephine Meredith.

The "Locals" section of the 1891 Dickinsonian included a quote by Professor Harman about male and female students. He is quoted as stating that, "Yes! The boys play foot ball and the girls take the prizes."

To further prove that Phi Mu’s refusal to allow a bid to go to an African American student was unjust, the creators of the soon-to-be Alpha Delta Epsilon sorority included in their scrapbook the membership statement of Phi Mu.

The November 1891 Dickinsonian declares in its pages about the prospective wedding of Zatae Longsdorff. She is to be married to a Dr. A Gale Straw on the fourteenth of November, 1891. Zatae's maids of honor were Lenora Whiting (Class of 1891) and Jessica Longsdorff (Class of 1891), her sister. The Dickinsonian "sends congratulations and well wishes after the happy couple."

Included in Marion Bell's scrapbook is a song composed by the Metzger Girls about their Dean, Josephine Meredith:

I.

"We are the girls from old Metzger Hall,

We might as well be within prison walls,

For the "Creep" is always there,

Lurking behind each door and chair,

She never laughs and she never smiles,

She disapproves of us and our styles,

As we girls go screaming by

She utters with a sigh:

"Nice girls don't scream."

II.

In Metzger Hall we ain't got no mice,

In the spring semester of 1967, the Beta Delta Chapter of the Phi Mu fraternity was preparing to offer bids for new members. In order to release bids and begin pledging, bid recommendations had to be signed by the District Recommendations Counselor, Mary Horst. After her request of the “racial statuses” of each of the recommended girls and being informed that one of the girls, Bobbie Swain, was of the “Negroid race,” Horst refused to sign the recommendation for said girl.

The whereabouts of the graduated class of 1891 is documented by the October 1891 issue of the Dickinsonian. Three of the female students are among the other graduates mentioned. Elizabeth Low is mentioned as a teacher in the public schools in Berwick, Pennsylvania, Jessica Longsdorff is studying at the Woman's Medical College in Philadelphia and Lenora Whiting is staying at her home in Carlisle.

Found in Marion Bell's personal scrapbook from her years at Dickinson College (1941-46), this document of six pages outlines female regulations in dress and socialization in games, bars, dancing, and dining, with a special section regarding social possibilities on Sundays. It also includes rules regarding curfews, tardiness, noise disturbances, and distinctions between freshman women and upperclassmen not "on rules- those having a 75 average." It even provides a section for transfer students.

The 1891 July Dickinsonian further comments on Jessica Longsdorff's performance for the Senior Oratorical Contest. Her oration was written on "The Uncrowned," which is about paintings from the French Revolution. The Dickinsonian proclaims that hers was "one of the best orations of the evening."

Clipped from a newspaper between 1941 and 1946 and placed in Marion Bell's personal scrapbook, this snippet shows the rules and regulations regarding women's attire at Dickinson. Marion Bell was known to wear slacks and this made her quite a rebel against this school rule. See Marion Bell, the Anti-Anti Bifurcationist.

The event of the Junior Oratorical Contest of 1891 was documented in the July issue of the Dickinsonian. Minnie Mack was the first speaker, who chose her subject to be "Woman's Work and Woman's Wages," which stirred much interest in those listening. She spoke on the "great injustice done to women, who...very often performing the same labor as men, yet received much less compensation." Minnie Mack then further comments on the changing times, how now women are more fitted for "mechanical or professional work" than the chief role of adorning a house.

Circa 1942, The Metzger Council divided itself into three new councils in addition to a fire drill committee to better provide for Dickinson's female students. A fire drill committee was created of Helen Kretschmar, Arline Mills, Nancy Tatnall, and Nancy Person in which regular drills would be planned.

The April issue of the Dickinson Women’s Newsletter calls for female voices to put on a dramatic reading for the college.  A program is being organized to showcase women’s expression, this expression being something that the author feels “women are working towards so desperately.”  A dramatic reading of Sylvia Plath’s piece, ‘Three Voices’ is to make up the second half of the program.  The article urges women to help with the program as readers, planners, and audience members.

The June 1891 Dickinsonian in the "Alumni Personals" section, included a brief paragraph on Hildegarde Longsdorff, one of the sisters of Zatae Longsdorff. The 1888 graduate, had recently graduated from the Women's Medical College of Philadelphia and intended on "practicing her profession" in Carlisle.

This candid photograph shows three female students, Rebecca Simmons (Class of 1954), Ann Barnard (Class of 1954), and Suzanne Ritter (Class of 1954), in the Dean of Women's office, Mary-Margaret Kellogg, circa 1950.

 

Candid shot of African American female students on Dickinson's campus, 1973. Dickinson College increases its diversity from the first woman to graduate in 1887, to the first known African American student graduating in 1901, and to the first known African American female student graduating in 1919.