Page 209 - WhyAsInY

you Can taKe tHe Boy out of BrooKlyn
For starters, before I even realized that a sizable portion of the class consisted of WASPs and preppies, I was forced to experience, rather than merely anticipate, the fact that all of the students were male. Now, I obviously knew when I applied that Amherst was a men’s college, but actually seeing that it was, was a shock to the system; a fairly high per- centage of my friends had been females, and here there were none. Females were now a weekend thing, if they were a thing at all.
Next, the population of the entire school was much smaller than my graduating class at Midwood; there were only about 225 freshmen, compared with approximately 1,100 graduates at Midwood. The small size of the school and class actually may have had the effect of accentu- ating differences. You felt obliged to know everyone, and between the picture book, which contained everyone’s high school (preparatory school?) yearbook photo, and the small campus, in a relatively short time, you had a sense that you recognized everyone and understood group differences. That sense was reinforced in Valentine Hall, the common dining facility. Ninety percent of upperclassmen were in fra- ternities (never say “frats”) at Amherst, but fraternities did not have their own kitchens. Thus, the whole student body ate in the two (and later, three) dining rooms of Valentine Hall. As I later learned, upper- classmen tended to dine with their own fraternity brothers, and many of the thirteen fraternities tended to attract members who many felt looked alike. It might well have been argued that many independents (people who did not join a fraternities) not only tended to dine together but looked alike as well.
Next, in September 1961, I was still only sixteen years of age. Far more than a majority of the freshmen were eighteen. Some were even older and had been in the army. One was married and had a child. Most could drive and drink, legally. I had never driven. Nor had I really imbibed any alcohol other than Manischewitz wine at a Seder, beer at L&M’s when I was a co-op, and tequila and boilermakers on that one memorable night when I was a canteen boy. While my age was some- what of an issue to me when it came to the Amherst campus, it was an obvious one when it came to Smith and Mount Holyoke. Whether or
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