In 1884, a toast to the new female students at Dickinson College was published in the Dickinsonian. The toast read, "The Ladies of Dickinson! May they add learning to beauty, and beauty to learning, subtract from the age of wisdom, multiply cheerfulness, divide time by industry and recreation, reduce idleness to its lowest denomination, and raise scholarship to its highest power!"
In October of 1884, The Dickinsonian published their first issue following the institution of coeducation. The "Locals" section includes an instance in which a professor forgot that he had female students in his class. The excerpt reads, "Prof. R.-- 'Now gentlemen--Oh! I beg your pardon, Miss Longsdorff.'" Zatae Longsdorff, the female student mentioned in this peice, was the first woman to graduate from Dickinson College.
In October of 1884, the Dickinsonian formally recognized coeducation at Dickinson College and explained that, "Co-education starts at Dickinson with a good prospect of success. Including those attending the preparatory school we have among us nearly a dozen of the fair sex."
In the October 1884 edition of the Dickinsonian, the staff of the paper addressed the resentment many male students felt toward the new female students. The author explained that "the impression seems to prevail that there will be too much "Co" and not enough "education." However, the article further explained, many of the male students admited that they realized that going coed was the "right thing to do."
The first mention of coeducation in the Dickinsonian appeared in October of 1884. The male editors of the Dickinsonian advised male faculty to not, "show any partiality to the co-eds. (Co-eds. in the parlance of to-day means girls) After-recitation communications cannot be tolerated. Private instructions to a co-ed are only justifiable where the subject is particularly hard to grasp."
In her memoir recounting her time at Dickinson, Elizabeth Low describes her time at Dickinson College. She wrote, "My college life seemed a little one sided and lopsided at that. I got the broader view, and about as bitter an experience as any girl could have."
In her 1951 memoir, Elizabeth A. Low discusses the reaction of many male students to the institution of coeducation. According to Low, many male students rescented early female students. Low explains, "So far as I know there was never any scandal connected with the name of any co-ed. Much of the opposition resulted from the fear that Dickinson would degenerate into a young ladies seminary-type."
In the History of the Sophomore Class of 1899, they mention their fellow female students as adding a certain quality to the class. The class of '99 felt that theirs would be the class to surpass "all previous ones in number, strength and manliness." Remembering the "co-eds," they then realized that they should "change that quality to womanliness." The writer remarks that about one-third of the sophomore class is comprised of women and they had even "taken possession" of the class.
An article in The Dickinsonian's celebration of the college's 90th anniversary entitled "Dolly Destroys Dickinson Tranquility As Students Protest Coed Admission" explains the 1884 furor over the admission of a coed on campus. When Dolly Longsdorf became the first coed, writes the author, the Freshman divided over the "coed question." Dolly and the Board of Trustees stood their ground, and sixteen women were admitted to the college by 1890. The college needed to remodel Old West in order to accomodate female students.
In her memoir recounting her time at Dickinson, Elizabeth Low remembers how she felt alienated as an early female student at Dickinson College. Low wrote, "Dickinson stressed the idea that women were admitted through the front door, on the same footing as men. This was only partially true. The men had their fraternities, their old established societies, glee and other musical clubs, athletics, field days, games through which contacts were made with the best colleges in the land. They were free to do many things proscribed for us...