For students planning to live on campus next year, the housing lottery is set to take place this week. Since 1770, when University Hall — Brown’s first building and dormitory on College Hill — was built, generations of Brunonians have lived all over campus in buildings that now house academic departments or no longer exist.
The Herald dove into the archives to explore how and where past and present Brunonians have lived on College Hill for over 250 years.
Early housing: building Middle Campus
The University — first known as Rhode Island College — was founded in 1764 and opened its doors in Warren, R.I. In 1770, Brown moved to its permanent home on College Hill.
The first student housing on campus came in the form of University Hall, which was known as the College Edifice until 1822, when Hope College was constructed.
Students lived on the second floor above their classrooms, according to Martha Mitchell’s Encyclopedia Brunoniana. Mitchell worked as an archivist for the University for over 50 years on and off before retiring in 2003 and later passing away in 2011.
The construction of University Hall was funded by a “public subscription campaign” using money likely tied to slave labor. The Herald previously reported that archival evidence has indicated that at least four enslaved men were forced to aid in the construction of the building.
University Hall housed students until 1925, and its fifth renovation in 1939 converted the building to a fully administrative space.
In a 1952 special edition of The Herald, then-Provost Samuel Arnold, class of 1913, wrote of his time living on the third floor of University Hall.
“It was rather a barren place,” Arnold wrote. “Classrooms separated the north and south sections, and the elevator now in operation was not even contemplated.”
Built in 1822, Hope College was the second building on campus and the first dedicated exclusively to student housing. The construction was funded by Nicholas Brown, and the building was named after his only surviving sister, Hope Brown Ives, according to a 1959 Herald article. After falling into disrepair throughout the early to mid 20th century, Hope College was restored in the late 1950s.
The third in the trio of dorms on the Main Green, then known as Middle Campus, was Slater Hall. The building’s foundation was first built in 1879 along George Street on the Main Green, but some protested the building’s placement, arguing that it would “obstruct the view of the campus,” according to Encyclopedia Brunoniana. The University moved the building to its current spot between University Hall and Rhode Island Hall.
“The dormitories were far from elegant,” Arnold wrote of the dorms present on campus during his undergraduate years. “The furniture was provided in most cases by the students and was passed down from year to year. It did not improve in the process of aging.”
Expanding Out: Ruth J. Simmons Quadrangle
As the University expanded, student housing options slowly grew. But several of the buildings constructed between the late 1890s and 1950s either no longer house students or no longer exist.
For example, Maxcy Hall, which currently houses the Department of Sociology, was built in 1895 and housed students on and off until 1959. Meanwhile, Richardson Hall — first known as Brunonia Hall — was built as a private dormitory in 1900 and bought by the University in 1920. But in 1996, Richardson Hall was razed to build Macmillan Hall, according to a 1996 Herald article.
A permanent fixture of student living, Caswell Hall was built in 1903 and named after former University President Alexis Caswell, class of 1822. Unlike other dorms that were furnished by students themselves, Caswell’s rooms came fully furnished.
“Each roomer is supplied with a desk, a desk chair, a rocking chair, several straight-backed chairs, a looking glass and a chiffonier,” The Herald reported in 1904. “Each room contains a brass bedstead and a mattress.”
The University provided furnishing for all dorms on campus starting in 1935, according to Encyclopedia Brunoniana.
Maxcy Hall, in the early 20th century, was known as the site of an “interclass fight,” The Herald mentioned in 1925. The writers worried that the new Hegeman and Littlefield Halls, built the same year, would become the next locations for the battles due to their proximity to Maxcy.
“Let us not consider the possibilities of such a casualty, but earnestly hope that for the present and in the future interclass conflicts will take place outside the buildings of the University,” The Herald wrote at the time.
In order to build the two new halls, houses in the locations of each dorm were razed in order for their construction, The Herald reported in 1925.
In an interview with The Herald, Bradley Kaplan ’89 explained that he lived on the first floor of Littlefield during his first year, directly next to the door.
“I remember this as a fond memory and a not-so-fond memory: day and night, 24/7, whoever came in and out the front door … it would wake me up if I was asleep.”
Kaplan also recalled a small green space that once existed between Littlefield and the John Carter Brown Library before the library’s Caspersen Building expansion — a location where his band enjoyed performing.
“We would play in front of Littlefield and you could actually have a little crowd, like your buddies, your friends and their friends sitting on this little hill,” Kaplan said. “It was just super cozy and your own little kind of mini, mini green.”
Demolition and Expansion: Wriston and Keeney Quadrangles
Campus housing saw its greatest expansion in the 1950s with the construction of Wriston and Keeney Quadrangles.
Wriston “Quadrangle is designed to promote social life as youthful and gay as people the age of its occupants need in order to be normal, but it is hoped it will discourage the excess and extremes which have long made the caricature of American students so easy and persuasive,” wrote former University President Henry Wriston in the 1952 Herald special edition.
But Wriston’s construction was no easy feat. The University struck a deal with the City of Providence to buy the blocks along Benevolent Street between Brown and Thayer Streets. To make enough space for the quadrangle, the University razed a total of 51 buildings, including multiple historic homes.
The quadrangle, surrounded by a dry moat, provided housing for hundreds of new Brown students and held a new dining hall: the Sharpe Refectory, quickly nicknamed “Rat-factory,” from which today’s “Ratty” moniker evolved. The new dining facility held enough room for 1,640 undergraduates in the main hall and private fraternity dining rooms on the main floor, while the downstairs Ivy Room, with a capacity of 200, was reserved for day students and University employees.
In 1944, fraternities agreed to give their off-campus housing to the University in exchange for recognized space in University housing on the new quadrangle. Buildings such as Angell Hall — which stood near where MacMillan Hall is now — were acquired by the University.
Moveable dividers existed in the hallways of dorms on the new quad to separate the fraternities from unaffiliated students, enlarging or contracting fraternity housing as needed.
Tensions quickly rose as university administrators felt that fraternities were taking over residence halls completely. In 1953, only seven rooms in Wayland House and eight rooms in Chapin House were occupied by students not affiliated with fraternities, according to a Herald article. To combat this, the buildings were completely dedicated to the fraternities, though fraternity members remained ambivalent.
“At least (the dorm members) are prospects for next year’s pledge class,” one fraternity member told The Herald at the time.
A few years later, in 1957, the University opened Keeney Quadrangle, then known as West Quadrangle. Separated into six different, but connected houses, the new quad held enough space for 541 students who were unaffiliated from fraternities, according to a 1957 special edition of The Herald.
As West Quad opened, the University continued to see an increase in first-years living on campus. In 1957, about 91% of the first-year class lived on campus, up from 80% in 1956, according to a Herald article.
The opening of West Quad also made the college 83% residential, returning to the levels seen in 1907, wrote former University Secretary Howard Curtis in The Herald. “With the West Quadrangle added to the Wriston Quadrangle, Brown University no longer has to be apologetic about its housing,” Curtis wrote.
But the need for first-year housing continued to increase. Five years later, in 1962, the Corporation dedicated West Quad to only be for first-years upon approval of a Housing Report.
The report also stipulated that fraternities reach a residential membership of at least 50 to “maintain their living and dining facilities,” The Herald reported.
Anne Vollen ’86 lived in Marcy Hall on Wriston Quad her sophomore year. She greatly appreciated the proximity to the dining hall: “We could practically roll into the Ratty a few minutes after waking up to get breakfast,” she wrote in an email to The Herald.
Vollen also enjoyed the social life on Wriston Quad.
“When my father dropped me off for sophomore year, he bought lumber and constructed a sleeping loft for me above (my roommate’s) bed, which maximized the floor space,” she recalled, adding that they used this floor space to host cocktail parties.
Robert Blair ’06, a professor of political science who lived in Harkness Hall his sophomore year, has fond memories of his Wriston dorm.
“I remember I was on the second floor, and there was a really good sense of community there,” he said. “I lived right across the hall from my closest friend, and I ended up making two of my other closest friends at Brown while we were living on that hall.”
Building Pembroke College
In 1891, Brown opened the Women’s College in Brown University — later renamed Pembroke College — its women-only sister school. Pembroke students were first offered on-campus housing in 1900 at the Slater Memorial Homestead, which is located at 66 Benefit Street. Renamed to Hallworth House, the building has recently been used as a center for unhoused people seeking medical care.
The building was sold in 1911 upon the construction of Miller Hall. Metcalf Hall, the second permanent dorm on the Pembroke Campus, was built across from Miller in 1919.
During this time period, various other buildings were used as housing for women, including East House and Sharpe House, according to Encyclopedia Brunoniana. East House was razed in 1952 for the construction of Howard Terrace, where the famous Pembroke Seal now lays. Sharpe House was moved in 2019 and merged with Peter Green House to hold the Department of History, The Herald previously reported.
Other Pembroke dorms included the Ellen Dexter Sharpe House, now known as Machado House, constructed in 1912. Sharpe gave the house to the University as a space for the Romance language departments.
In 1947 — just before Wriston was built — Pembroke gained Andrews Hall. The building connected Metcalf and Miller Halls and provided Pembrokers with a new dining hall.
Before Pembroke College merged with the College — the men’s college — in 1971, four more dorms were added to Pembroke. Champlin and Morriss Halls were dedicated in 1960, while Emery and Woolley Halls were dedicated in 1963 along with the Verney-Woolley dining hall.
“Pembroke was a very separate campus,” Leila Heckman ’66 told The Herald.
But rules for Pembrokers were strict, including dress codes and curfews.
At the occasional 4 p.m. tea hosted by the University, “we had to wear white gloves,” Heckman recalled. “Men were allowed to visit you in the dorms on Sunday afternoon, but you had to keep the door open.”
During her time on Pembroke, Heckman lived in Andrews Hall before moving into Woolley.
Dorms go coed
The late ’60s saw the construction of the Graduate Center, according to Encyclopedia Brunoniana. As its name suggests, Grad Center was initially constructed for graduate student housing, but soon became a residence hall for undergraduate students.
Dorms first went coed in 1969 when 57 Pembrokers moved into the top two floors of Diman Hall on Wriston Quad. Alpha Pi Lambda, which resided in the building at the time, offered associate memberships to women living in the building, according to Encyclopedia Brunoniana.
Kaplan lived on the fourth floor of Diman in the 1980s for two years. During his second year in the building, he lived in a single with a bay window that he turned into a “mini day bed” where he would listen to music from his turntable.
“It just had a vibe and great natural light,” Kaplan said to The Herald. “That single was special.”
As Pembroke College integrated with the wider University in the next few years, the rest of the dormitories on campus went coed. In 1970, women threatened a boycott of the housing lottery if more dorms did not go coed.
When asked about coed dorms in 1982, then-University President Howard Swearer said “Do coed dorms create problems or solve them? I would have to say ‘yes.’”
During this debate over coed dormitories, plans for construction of the New Pembroke dorms began in 1969.
“Perhaps the (Building and Planning Committee of the Corporation) does not wish to plan a completely coed dormitory at this time, but they can at least provide for the option of coed living in the proposed facilities — and not by means of a divider wall,” the Pembroke Record wrote at the time.
The design for the dorms won the 1970 Progressive Architecture design award, and construction took place in 1974.
Bryant and Beyond
In 1969, the University acquired its East Campus from Bryant University. New dormitories included Barbour Hall (then Appleby Hall) which was later expanded, Perkins Hall (then Gardner Hall) and King House, which was originally Bryant University’s administrative headquarters, according to Encyclopedia Brunoniana.
Vollen lived in Perkins her first year, where she formed a “tight-knit group” of friends and enjoyed the late night snacks at now-closed East Campus Dining Center, or “Eck-Deck.”
“We were right across the street from WBRU, so we would ambush bands being interviewed there,” she wrote in an email to The Herald. One band, The English Beat, “even gave my friend and me free tickets and backstage passes to their show at the Living Room.”
WBRU resides at 88 Benevolent Street and now shares its home with The Brown Daily Herald, which moved its headquarters from 195 Angell Street five years ago.
A photo of Young Orchard Avenue from a 1972 edition of The Herald.
The University continued its expansion onto the old Bryant Campus with the construction of the Young Orchard dorms. The University first petitioned, as it had many times before, to take over the section of Young Orchard Avenue between Hope and Cooke Streets before proceeding with construction. Several historic houses were razed in 1973 to make room for the new Young Orchard dorms.
The 1990s saw construction of yet another quadrangle on Thayer Street. Later named for Vartan Gregorian, two dorms were constructed along with the dining hall, Josiah’s. The dorms, colloquially known for years as “New Dorm,” are now known to students as “Greg.” Then, in 2002, Minden Hall — a former hotel that was rented as dorms to Johnson and Wales University — was reclaimed by the University and converted to housing for Brown students.
COVID-19 to now
During the COVID-19 pandemic, the University aimed to bring as many students back to campus as possible. Undergraduates ended up living in temporary arrangements, including River House, which is now housing for graduate students, and the Omni Hotel in downtown Providence.
Since 2020, the University has seen the opening of several new dormitories. Wellness Residential Experience at Sternlicht Commons, known to students as Wellness, welcomed residents in summer 2021. As the first new dorm construction in 35 years, the new building emphasized sustainability.
Most recently, the Brook Street residence halls — Chen Family Hall and Danoff Hall, which opened in fall 2023 — capped off the catalogue of available dormitories. The two dorms contain specialty housing focused on religious and spiritual life, sustainability and civic engagement.
After living on Keeney Quad and in Perkins, Faith Chen ’26 has lived in both Wellness and Chen Family Hall.
“It’s insane that we pay the same amount of money for Keeney as we do for Chen,” she said in an interview with The Herald. “I feel like I won the lottery.”
Correction: A previous version of this article incorrectly stated that Pembroke College merged with the University in 1971. Pembroke College merged with the College — the men’s college — in 1971. The article also misdated a statement made by Howard Swearer on coed dorms to 1972. Swearer made the comment in 1982. He was president of the University from 1977 to 1988. The Herald regrets these errors.
Ian Ritter is a senior staff writer covering graduate schools and students. He is a sophomore from New Jersey studying Chemistry and International and Public Affairs. When he’s not at the Herald, you can find him playing clarinet or explaining the rules of kickball to confused listeners.
