Once upon a time at the outset of the Roaring Twenties, alcohol was banned at Dartmouth during Prohibition,. As the self-reliant and responsible people that we've always been, Dartmouth students took the ban as an opportunity to invent new and creative ways to socialize and spend their free time. Obviously, water pong was born! And while 1920s Keystone didn't flow freely from underground, sexual activity (with Smith women!) on campus dramatically decreased. Support groups formed to help students get over their fear of soberly hooking up. To compensate for the loss of their favorite beverages at tails, frat brothers invented non-alcoholic punches so delicious that guests got giddy off of how good they tasted and forgot that they weren't drinking alcohol.
Wait who am I kidding? Dartmouth students are some of the most intelligent and resourceful students in the nation, and even though on Jan. 16, 1920, the 18th Amendment would make the manufacture, sale and distribution of alcohol illegal in the United States until December 1933, Dartmouth students put their skills to use to find new ways to secure alcohol.
In fact, just five months after Prohibition had been put in place, alumnus Thomas Groves wrote a letter to then-President Ernest Hopkins reporting that his friends from other colleges were referring to Dartmouth as the "Cuba of the North," and that their sons in prep school were gloating ahem, jealously about how plentiful alcohol was in Hanover.
At Dartmouth, rules are often only made to be broken,ww and a nationwide ban on alcohol gave students even more of a desire to drink. After spending a few nights at the Hanover Inn hearing rowdy crowds with "enough men to make up four football teams staggering along the street under my window," Groves estimated in his letter that there was twice as much drinking than there had been in the past six years. [Insert cliche about nobody raging anymore].
Hopkins, however, was not concerned by Groves' letter. In his response, Hopkins said he trusted his students, believing that only minimal levels of administrative interference would be necessary, for students would remedy the situation through their own actions (seriously???).
Students took advantage of Hopkins' lax policies and soon began distributing alcohol in dorms. Alcohol flowed in from near and far. Hanover itself had two to three stills in operation, one of which was producing a "rather deadly brew," the Hanover Precinct Commissioners reported.
Students' cleverness and desperation also meant that their means of liquor transport were as creative and diverse as their sources of supply. In addition to taking cars, whiskey was carried down from Canada in boats and canoes, while railroad operators would temporarily sidetrack freight cars to isolated points, where they could unload booze into a truck.
Although bootlegging at Dartmouth kept students giddy and in touch with their favorite past times, it also brought tragedy to the College. Hopkins reported that three students almost died from drinking bathtub-made alcohol during the period of Prohibition.
These illegal operations also provoked murder. In 1920, one of Dartmouth's top bootleggers was Robert Meads '19. At the time, Henry Maroney '20, a brother at Theta Delta Chi, arranged to purchase a handle of whiskey from Meads. Maroney was unable to come up with the money, but he didn't let that get in his way. He snuck into Meads' room in Mid Mass, grabbed the handle and ran back to Theta Delt. Meads, however, wanted his money, so later that night, he went to Theta Delt to find Maroney in his room, where he shot him twice through the heart.Although Meade fled the scene, he was later convicted of murder and put in jail.
After the murder, Theta Delt became known as the "Boom Boom Lodge." Today, brothers at Theta Delt consider the story an important part of their history.
"We've embraced it as a house motto," Theta Delt President Will Mueller '12 said. "There are a couple of house traditions about it. We do a couple of things for sink night which involve telling stories on the seventh step, which is where he got shot."
He added that he did not think the dark history is a negative aspect of Theta Delt.
"We think about it as an interesting story," he said. "[It's] a cool way that Dartmouth and Theta Delt relate to Prohibition and a larger American history."
At the time, however, the matter was more serious. Hopkins struggled to maintain Dartmouth's reputation after the incident received national attention. Although Hopkins claimed that he'd reported the extent to which Canadian liquor was being imported to the internal revenue officers in an effort to remedy the situation, he denied that there had been any alcohol smuggling in Hanover, according to a June 1920 report to the Associated Press.
In time, Hopkins did make efforts to stop what rowdiness he could. In January 1931, Hopkins wrote a letter to his treasurer about his concern after receiving word of a particularly "boisterous party" rumored to be taking place over Winter Carnival. He noted that "bootleggers are exceedingly busy in the dorms at the present time soliciting orders for the Carnival season" and called for increased security by having at least one officer go around to "discourage" drinking in dorms and frats. A dry Carnival? Nice try, Hopkins.
However, after 12 years of failing to control the students, Hopkins released a statement in April 1932 in favor of repealing the 18th Amendment. He justified his claim through personal observation, saying that he'd rather have drinking under the eyes of respectable people rather than have youth running to roadhouses and speakeasies. Other university presidents felt his pain: A poll at that time showed that less than 25 percent of college presidents in the United States approved of the amendment.
We could lament what happened at Dartmouth during Prohibition. We could choose to be appalled that students would turn their college into one of the biggest providers of alcohol in the North, that alumni would threaten to turn against our beloved school and that bootlegging would result in the murder of a student. Or you could look at the other side of things. That is, Prohibition was arguably the most badass time at Dartmouth. It's proof that when anyone tries to threaten our traditions whether it be a student, Safety and Security or even the national government we'll do anything we can to make sure we maintain them.
