NEW YORK CITY -- Everyone, from the women in business attire to the seersucker-clad men, is moving at the standard Ivy League crawl in the Dartmouth Club in midtown Manhattan.
Upon entering the Yale Club, with which the Dartmouth Club shares facilities, it is hard to escape the traditional scenery that is more reminiscent of Sanborn House than a playground of Ivy League graduates.
Although Dartmouth shares the building with Yale, Yalies dominate the atmosphere. From pictures of Yale's presidents to the after dinner mints wrapped with Yale's insignia and name, Dartmouth is pushed aside.
The club offers a wide array of scheduled events, a massage parlor, a barbershop, nautilus equipment, three squash courts and a pool. Locker rooms feature cushy couches and mahogany lockers.
The Yale Club also offers a wide variety of dining options -- the roof dining room features an outdoor terrace that looks out over surrounding buildings on Vanderbilt Avenue and 45th street.
The Grill Room, with its 20-foot high arced ceilings, and the Tap Room are reminiscent of medieval times with their rustic chandeliers and coats of arms displayed on the wall.
In conjunction with the Dartmouth Alumni Association of New York City and the Yale Club, Dartmouth Club members may participate in any event planned, according to Barrett Weeks '79, the executive director of DAANYC and the Dartmouth Club.
Dartmouth has been sharing facilities with the Yale Club since 1975 after the Princeton Club, with whom the Dartmouth Club had been sharing space, moved.
Because of the high price of New York City real estate and the enormous expense for upkeep, Dartmouth chose to share Yale's 22-floor facility with Yale, Weeks said, rather than move with Princeton.
Thomas R. Trowbridge IV, a Yale freshman who frequents the "YC" with signing privileges from his father, said he feels the reasons for admitting Dartmouth into the Club were financially motivated.
Currently, 1,000 Dartmouth graduates are members of the Yale Club, down from 1,200 in 1991.
Despite the efforts of the Dartmouth Club to integrate members into the Yale Club, some say the Club is just too foreign for them.
At first glance, there appears to be no sign of Dartmouth's presence, with the exception of a small glass case with the club's plaque and recent press releases, which hang by the elevators.
"I think it's absolutely abhorrent that we don't have a club of our own," LeAnne Armano '96 said. "I don't want to go to a club where everything is blue and has Yale on it."
Yale, according to Weeks, rejected Dartmouth's attempts to hoist a banner in front of the building or to paint the door leading to the Dartmouth Club's small one room office green.
"They figured two banners draws more attention to the club for terrorists and things," Weeks joked. "Primarily, they didn't want to waive a green flag in the Yale members' faces."
"I thinks it makes [Dartmouth] people uncomfortable to go to the Yale Club," Kim Sanderson '96 said. "It's not really the Dartmouth Club -- it doesn't even have any green."
Despite Weeks' insistence that Dartmouth members are integrated, some Yale graduates did not seem to know Dartmouth grads could join.
One woman approached Weeks and asked, "Where is the Dartmouth Club? We went to the Princeton Club, but we don't know the Dartmouth Club."
The club's steep membership price, which begins at $400 and increases every two or three years, may turn off perspective members.
The Dartmouth Club will only admit undergraduates after junior year due to the open-bar policy. Until then, students may participate in club activities by paying a cover fee for each event.
