Lycoming College - Arrow Yearbook (Williamsport, PA)

Page 15 text:

. . . present. In 1968 the Academic Center was constructed; and today the largest fund raising effort in Lycoming ' s history is producing an athletic center to fulfill the needs of the students. iycoming College has cenainly come a long way in its years of existence. It is hoped that the graduates of the Class of 1980 will go as far.

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and . . . In 1935 the Seminary became the first fully accredited junior college in Pennsylvania. Army Aviation cadets with their officers in 1943 occupied all dormitory rooms. In 1946 a request was sent to the Methodist Church to establish a four year college. On May 8, 1947 the State Council of Education of Pennsylvania officially approved the institution as a four year Liberal Arts College. Later that year the Board of Directors selected the name Lycoming College for the new college. Since 1947 Wesley Hall was erected, Wertz Student Union Building was built, and a brewery was renovated into the science building.

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The Dras on Tale The exact origin of the dragon remains somewhat obscure, but those who can recall that era at Lycoming say it was painted by a group of students in the 194 ' -18 Frill and Frown dramatic club. It was inspired, so we hear, by the acquisition (and this is still a mystery) of some hand-carved Chinese furni- ture which was used to decorate the drama clubroom-lounge just down the hall from the Dragon Room. Consisting of a love-seat and two arm-chairs, this oriental suite subse- quently appeared in various campus spots and uses — as stage property, as a May Da - throne, as scavengered seating for the Lambda Chi Alpha fraternity house, as junk in the theatre shop and most recently as stage prop- erty once more. Last year technical director Mike Welch unearthed si.x pieces of one of the chairs, wired it together, had it painted, and used it as the queen ' s throne in the I ' XiS production of Under the Sycamore Tree. Our dragon fared better. Each year the maintenance crew has touched up the paint so that today its green-black scales and flaming nostrils are still a striking sight. So striking, in fact, that freshmen, short on Lyco tradition but long on curiosity, upon hearing rumors of the esteemed serpent line up each fall outside the windows of Bradley to peer at him. They could afford to wait. Chances are they will eventually meet him face to face in class. With our limited classroom space we have through the years used the Dragon Rcxjm for classes in nearly every subject out- side of the sciences. One former German teacher seemed to have a particular affection for the monster, always returning to her native tongue to call for class in the dra- chenshalle. This unique hall has housed club meetings, slide talks, recording sessions, and demonstrations. It has housed stage, crews building and painting sets. For a time it and two adjacent smaller rooms served as campus radio broadcasting studios. Its small stage has made it very favorable for speech students performing orally, for rehearsals, and for inti- mate drama staging. Currently it is the scene of the Thursday Theatre, a weekly four p.m. theatre forum open to students and faculty who present original works, experiment with avant-garde plays, or learn from the spontane- ity of improvisations. Through its continued and varied use, the Dragon Room has thus become a familiar, though puzzling, part of the daily scene. But to many Lycoming stu- dents it has always been the symbol for that rather esoteric undergraduate experience — campus theatre. By scanning we see that for a number of years theatre at Lycoming College was wholly extracurricular, sporadically good, and always a ball for the ■participants. It was in the form 12