In the years before coeducation, Dartmouth men might have spent most of the winter dateless in the bitter cold of New Hampshire, but thanks to an onslaught of buses and trains carrying upwards of 1000 coeds from women's colleges across the Northeast, few remained alone for Winter Carnival.
As many of the celebrated weekend's events centered on coupling up, the demand for dates was high. In 1955 enough women journeyed up to provide company for just under two thirds of Dartmouth's student body.
Women took over vacated residential halls and fraternities and filled the area's bed and breakfasts to capacity. In those dorms where residents had not been forced out for the weekend chaperones patrolled the hallways to ascertain that women stayed out after already extended visiting hours.
In its 1960 Winter Carnival edition, The Dartmouth printed the following notice to its visitors: "Welcome to Hanover and the gala 50th Winter Carnival. Mrs. Westerberg informs us that you're one of an estimated 2000 young women who have invaded Hanover. Just one thing... Are you over 14?"
Snow Queens and Screwdrivers
Once on campus, a number of these women took part in what was perhaps the most heavily followed event of the weekend: the Carnival Queen pageant.
This tradition, which began in 1923, reached its zenith during the late 1930s and 40s. By 1940, the affair had achieved such popularity that The Dartmouth felt compelled to announce its winner with a half page headline.
The ceremony itself, held during the "Outdoor Evening," was an elaborate affair. In 1960, several women's national ice skating champions were flown in to preside over a full-scale parade, which made its way onto the golf course and included the lighting of an "Olympic torch" -- all this to fit in with the Carnival's "Swiss Holiday" theme.
The Queen was crowned at the conclusion of the procession as the Freshman Octet serenaded her with, "There's No One Like You".In covering the event, The Dartmouth went so far as to publish winner Suzanne L. Horney's vital stats: "The blond, blue-eyed Queen stands 5 feet 3 inches tall, and weighs a modest 110 pounds."
The Carnival Queen competition was not, however, a central event for all women visiting.
"If that was happening, I wasn't anywhere near it," said Linda Lapin, one of an estimated 2000 women to descend on campus in 1960.
Yet even without the peculiar task of presenting one's self to a judging panel of fraternity boys and alumni, the experience of Winter Carnival remained a strange one for visiting women.
Lapin, then a student at Mount Holyoke, arrived at the dorm of her blind date around 4p.m., only to find him serving screwdrivers.
"I think I had one -- he had about six," she recalled. "Before we left the dorm, he was staggering, falling down drunk."
The remainder of Lapin' weekend visit proceeded in similar fashion. Friday evening, in his inebriated state, Lapin's date was unable to recall the location of her bed and breakfast. The two wandered the streets of Hanover late into the night, with the Dartmouth student repeatedly collapsing into snowdrifts.
Apparently taking the time to recover from the previous evening's festivities, Lapin's date then neglected to pick her up until 2 p.m. the next afternoon. At this point, Lapin was packing her bag in preparation to leave.
"It was the worst experience ever -- anyway, the ice sculptures were nice. Otherwise it was hell," Lapin said with a laugh.
Gender Wars
The establishment of coeducation in 1972 signaled the beginning of the end for both the long-held tradition of importing women into Hanover and the Carnival Queen competition.
The changeover was not immediate. In 1973, the majority of the College's male students, mindful of the less than advantageous 8:1 male-female ratio, persisted in bussing in their dates.
This action left 30-50 percent of Dartmouth's female students dateless, and led to a minor war between the College's loyal sons and its newly enrolled daughters. A third of the single women felt compelled to "boycott" Winter Carnival by fleeing to visit friends in other cities.
"So many guys simply assume that we all have dates that they don't even bother to ask us out. Others resent us for bursting into 'their' College. And still other guys labor under the illusion that we're inaccessible bitches," bemoaned a sophomore transfer student in a feature published by The Dartmouth.
A self-described frat row "ass man" who had elected to bring up a girl from "one of the more notorious junior colleges in this area," offered up the following explanation: "I haven't seen a half dozen girls on campus who appeal to me... They dress so poorly -- baggy overalls and flannel shirts don't do much to accentuate their nubile young figures. Their grooming is atrocious."
