Rochdale College
Opened in 1968, Rochdale College was an experiment in alternative student-run education and co-operative living in Toronto, Canada. Also known as the Rochdale Project, it was associated with Innis College, University of Toronto.
Co-operative Housing experiment
Rochdale was the largest co-op residence in North America, and the second co-op student residence opened in Canada. Rochdale occupied an 18-storey student residence at Bloor St. and Huron St. in Toronto. It was situated on the edges of the University of Toronto campus and near Yorkville, Canada’s hippie haven in the 1960s and early 1970s.
Rochdale took its name from Rochdale, England, where the world's first attempt at cooperative housing took place in the 1800s.
The college’s modern architecture was uniquely designed for communal living. Some areas were divided into independently-operated communal units of about a dozen bedrooms (called Ashrams), each with its own collective washroom, kitchen and dining room. Each unit was responsible for collecting rent and maintaining its own housekeeping. Other areas consisted of bachelor, one-bedroom, and two-bedroom apartments. On the first and second floor were common areas used for socialization, education, and commercial purposes. The roof was accessible from the 18th floor and was used for sunbathing. Clothing was optional.
Educational ideals
In the late sixties, universities were a centre of political idealism and experimentation. Rochdale College was established as an alternative to what were considered traditional paternalistic and non-democratic governing bodies within university education. Conversely, Rochdale's government policy was decided at open meetings in which all members of the co-operative could attend, participate in debate, and vote.
It was the largest of more than 300 tuition-free universities in North America, and offered no structured courses, curriculum, exams, degrees, or traditional teaching faculty. It became a hot bed of free thought and radical idealism, in many ways resembling a tribal community.
Traditional professors were replaced by “Resource People” of various academic and non-academic backgrounds, who would lead informal discussion groups on a wide variety of subjects, as opposed to structured classes. A Resource Person of note was author Dennis Lee.
Students had complete freedom to develop their own learning process, much of which emerged from the shared community experience. The college included theatres for drama and film, and a ceramics studio. Students decided school policy and made their own evaluations.
Rochdale students where involved with various cultural institutions in Toronto such as Coach House Press, Theatre Passe Muraille, The Toronto Free Dance Theatre, and House of Anansi Press.
It was typical of the free universities not to award degrees and the University of Toronto did not offer degrees through Rochdale College, but anyone could purchase a B.A. by donating $25 to the college and answering a simple skill-testing question. An M.A. was $50, and the applicant could pick the question. A Ph.D. did not require any skill-testing question, and sold for $100.
The Rochdale application also described its "non-degree": "We are also offering Non-Degrees at comparable rates. A Non-Ph.D. is $25.00. Course duration is your choice; requirements are simple, we ask that you say something. A Non-M.A. is $50.00 for which we require you to say something logical. A Non-B.A. is $100.00; you will be required to say something useful."
Rochdale ran its own radio station called CRUD, with a bizarre assortment of music, talk and static. The Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission tried to shut the station down a number of times, but the dedication of its staff kept it on the air.
The Rochdale community was very tolerant, so it was not unusual for residents to wander nude or openly use soft drugs within its rooms and corridors.
A film buff named Reg Hartt was approached to find a bootleg copy of the porn classic, Deep Throat. When he screened it at the college, he charged $10 admission, but there was no charge for those who came naked.
Drug culture
Rochdale was originally a refuge for the nation’s idealistic hippies in 1968. This included homeless squatters and bikers who dealed hard drugs. Rochdale had also become a haven for American draft dodgers.
According to the CBC archives [1] , by 1971 Rochdale had become known as “’North America's largest drug distribution warehouse.’ Hash, pot, and LSD are in large supply. The Rochdale security force includes members of biker gangs.”
The CBC archives also describe how “Due to problems with cops and bikers, the governing council set up a paid security force to be on 24-hour alert. Ironically, some of these security people were bikers themselves. As had happened in Yorkville, an unofficial alliance with the Vagabonds motorcycle club developed.”
While at this time the Canadian authorities were tolerant of soft drugs within the contained environment of the college building, the hard drug trade also continued, resulting in frequent clashes with police and drug-related deaths. Local news reported 50 drug-overdoses had been delivered to local hospitals including 3 dead on arrival [2].
Rochdale’s educational focus and student population declined as the drug business increased.
With the increase in clashes with police political pressure forced Rochdale to close in 1975. A number of residents refused to leave, however. On May 30, the last residents were carried from the building by police. The doors to the college had to be welded shut.
The building
The 18-storey tower that once housed Rochdale at 341 Bloor Street is now known as the Senator David A. Croll Apartments. Completed in 1968, it is the sister building to the Tartu student residence a short distance west across Bloor street. Designed by the architects Tampold and Wells (who had earlier constructed the Charles Street Apartments at Bay Street and Bloor Street), it is ironic that such as a hub of creativity and counter cultural ideology was housed within such a harsh, yet restained, concrete Brutalism.
As homage to its Rochdale days, the tower features the large and intriguing “Unknown Student” sculpture out front.
- "Love it or loathe it, Rochdale College is hard to dismiss even 20 years after its closing." (University of Toronto Magazine, Spring, 1995, p.38.)
External links
- Video clips and descriptions of Rochdale College and Canadian culture from the era from the CBC archives.
- Historic Rochdale documents from Libraries and Archives Canada.
- Documentary and interview with a former resident.
- Architectural description of the building.
- A personal reflection of a former resident
- The story of Rosie Rowbotham, one of the suppliers of marijuana to Rochdale.
- The documentary film “Dream Tower” about Rochdale by Ron Mann.