McGill University - Old McGill Yearbook (Montreal Quebec, Canada)

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Random Recollections OF AN UNDERGRADUATP: of fifty years A(X3 WRITTEN FOR OLD McGILL, 1934 by PROFESSOR NEVIL NORTON EVANS. M.A. Sc. HALF a centur - ago, the College grounds were separated from Sherbrooke Street by a wooden fence, and wooden gates led into the Avenue. Just inside, and on the left of the entrance, was a picturesque little stone lodge, where lived the Groundsman with his family. During the excavation of the railway tunnel under the mountain, this little building was so injured by the blasting that it had to be taken down (about 1918), and it has not been replaced. A wooden sidewalk ran from Sherbrooke Street north to the Main Building, with a turn-otY to the left to the Redpath Museum, which was opened in 1882. To the east of the Avenue was some grassy, level ground, beyond which, and behind the houses on University Street, there was a picturesque little glen. Through this there ran a little brook, or burn, which gave the name Burnside to James McGill ' s farm. Beside it there wound a delightful shady path, much admired of lovers; and near by was a spring of delicious clear, cold drinking water, now, alas, under the Chemistry and Mining Building. Behind the Redpath Museum was the Observatory, a storey lower than it is today; and across the head of the Avenue was the Arts Building; while a little further to the east, and a little back, was the Old Medical Building, occupying the site of the front of the present Biology Building. These were all the University Buildings on the Campus in those days. During the reconstruction of the Arts Building in 1926, thanks to the ingenuity of the architects, the old facade was so little changed externally that the general impression now made is much the same as it was half a century ago. The building then consisted of three parts, the Molson Hall to the left, the Centre Building, and the East Wing on the right. These three portions were connected by one-storey structures, the westerly one of which housed the Museum (till 1882), and the easterly one the Chemical Laboratory and adjoining Lecture Room. The East Wing was originally intended for students ' dormitories, but was never used as such. It was divided into two parts, front and back, the front part being the Principal ' s residence, and the back that of the gentleman who exercised the functions of Secretary, Registrar and Bursar. The door of the Principal ' s residence (above the present Office door) was reached by two curving flights of steps, while a very small door in the east wall gave admission to the other residence. The Bursar ' s office itself was on the ground floor, immediately inside the little door, consisted of one small room, and was presided over by the official himself and, later, one clerk. Not infrequently, in the early days, one found the ofifice empty; and then an elderly gentleman, in black frock coat and slippers, would appear from upstairs. The Principal had a very small office in the Main Building, and the Dean of Arts a smaller one, and neither of them had a secretary. No private offices were provided for Professors: they generally hung their coats and hats in the Faculty Room, which was on the ground floor; and if a student wished to see one of the staff, he had to meet him in his class-room, either just before or just after a lecture! On passing through the main entrance of the Centre Building, which housed both the Faculty of Arts and the Faculty of Applied Science, one entered a large hall or passage, run- 23

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PROFESSOR NEVIL NORTON EVANS, M.A.Sc. AUTHOR OF ' RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS OF AN UNDERGRADUATE OF FIFTY YEARS AGO ' 22

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19 3 4 19 3-4. ning east and west, from each end of which there ascended a flight of wooden stairs to landings above. Immediately across from the front door were the Faculty Room and the English Lecture Room where Professor Moyse lectured. This latter was just where the back of Moyse Hall now is. Passing out of the west end of the hallway, beside the stairs, one entered the back of the old Chemistry Class Room, which, till the opening of the Redpath Museum, had also been used for Geology, Mineralogy, Botany, Zoology, etc. It was a gently sloping amphitheatre style of lecture room, with curved wooden benches and curved shelves — they could hardly be called desks— very much carved with initials, mottoes, etc. At the time of the rebuilding of the structure, in 1926, many of the Graduates requested that this room, with its various embellishments, be left unchanged, if possible; but it was found that this could not be done without seriously interfering with the general plan of the new interior. The blackboard in this room, as in the other lecture-rooms, was nothing more nor less than a portion of the wall- plaster, surrounded by a wooden frame and painted black. It was constantly chipping out, and required frequent treatment with ink to retain a uniform black surface. Opposite the front door, high up in the main hall, was the gong, rung by hand from the basement, but occasionally rendered vocal by means of an overshoe or other missile. Under the stairways aforementioned were sets of lockers, really nothing but boxes, about one cubic foot each. These were the private property of the Janitor, who had the letting of them to the students. There were hooks on the walls of the hall where overcoats and hats could be hung by those who did not care to crowd them into the lockers. One of the first things a freshman did was to purchase a gown — and generally from the Janitor; and this had to be worn at all lectures, though it might be so ragged and incomplete as to be almost unrecognizable. Some of the Professors were very strict about this, others were obligingly blind on occasion. The good old Dean of Arts, affectionately known as Pat, was one of the former. If he spotted an ungowned man in his class, he would look towards the other side of the sanctum and repeat: There ' s a sthranger in the room, there ' s a sthranger in the room, till the delinquent removed himself. The gown rule was very strictly enforced at examinations. On one occasion an unfortunate was unable to find a gown, and was told by the Dean he would have to leave. A friend offered to tear off part of his own ragged gown, if that would suffice; and the Dean ruled that, if the unclothed could get at least one arm through the fragment somewhere, he might remain. A mighty rent was soon made which rendered this possible and the now academically clothed candidate was allowed to remain and write. The examinations were held in the Molson Hall, which was prepared for this pur- pose by removing half of the horsehair-covered benches which usually filled it, and replacing them by long boards on little wooden trestles. There were not infrequently rushes in the main hall and in the passages upstairs. It is a wonder that there were never any serious accidents, as the banisters on the upper halls were just ordinary ones, and often came perilously near to giving way. On all such occasions the Dean of Arts would appear and read the Riot Act, threatening dire penalties; and the row would gradually subside. There was one small laboratory for chemical work, but no others — nothing for Physics, Zoology, Botany, Engineering, c. There was one draughting room at the top of the building, and when this became inadequate, one or two of the larger passages were divided lengthwise by thin wooden partitions, one side being thus shut in, and there draughting tables were set up. The Freshman Class in Applied Science (Engineering) had to go downtown two nights a week, to the east end of St. James Street, where the Council of Arts and Manufactures had rooms, for instruction in freehand drawing; and during the freshman year of the writer, ' 82- ' 83, three arc lights were erected on the thoroughfare just mentioned to see whether this form of illumination would be suitable for street lighting. In those days there were no movies, no (Condnued on page 27) I I I 1 24