Saturday, February 18, 2012

Fight Fiercely Harvard



Sports arenas don't last forever; even the original, hallowed Yankee Stadium was eventually deemed antiquated, torn down, and replaced, and the shiny new Shea Stadium of my childhood endured for a paltry thirty-five years or so. Harvard Stadium, only a year or two old when the postcard above was created, has managed to survive for more than a century, so maybe it has now reached the point where its very antiquity will ensure its indefinite preservation.

Be that as it may, I can't help but be reminded of this stirring rendition from the inimitable Tom Lehrer:


Since we're in the neighborhood, below is another Rotograph of Harvard, this one showing the university's Johnson Gate, which also survives.


According to an article in the Harvard Gazette:
The gate is named for Samuel Johnston, Class of 1855, who left Harvard $10,000 for its construction. A resident of Chicago, Johnston is described in his 1886 obituary as a bachelor and a "well-known capitalist," and by a fellow member of the Chicago Club as "a short, ruddy faced bon-vivant." A book of reminiscences by one of Johnston's neighbors describes him drinking a toast on the front steps of his house as the Chicago fire blazed nearby.

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