House system at the California Institute of Technology
The House System is the basis of undergraduate student residence at the California Institute of Technology (Caltech). Caltech's unique House system is modelled after the residential college system of Oxford and Cambridge in England; and is also similar to the fictional houses of Hogwarts in Harry Potter. Like a residential college, a House embodies two closely-connected concepts — it is both an organization with which students are affiliated, and a physical building where a majority of its members reside and which serves as the center of social activity for its members.
The Houses resemble fraternities at other American universities in the shared loyalties they engender, but are unlike fraternities in that every student is required to join a House, and usually remains affiliated with that one House for the duration of their undergraduate studies.
Caltech established the House System in 1931, recasting the existing fraternities as Blacker House, Dabney House, Fleming House and Ricketts House, now known as the South Houses. Expanding student population was accommodated in 1960 with the North Houses: Lloyd House, Page House, and Ruddock House. A new state-of-the-art residential facility named Avery House, was opened in 1996, but was not initially considered part of the House System, and freshmen were not allowed to live there (the current state of affairs is in flux, as frosh will live in Avery in the 2005–2006 school year).
| House | Members | Color | Slogan | Motto | Website |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| South Houses (Hovses) | |||||
| Blacker Hovse | Moles | Black | γδβγ (God Damn Blacker Gang) | http://blacker.caltech.edu/ | |
| Dabney Hovse | Darbs | Green | DEI (Dabney Eats It) | Fidelis et Gratus | http://www.ugcs.caltech.edu/~dei/ |
| Fleming Hovse | Flems | Red | FEIF (Fleming Eats It Faster) | Let the Deed Shaw | http://fleming.caltech.edu/ |
| Ricketts Hovse | Scurves / Skurves | Maroon | F*** God Dead | Prend Moi Tel Que Je Suis | http://ricketts.caltech.edu/ |
| North Houses | |||||
| Lloyd House | Lloydies | Gold | I Live And Die For Those I Love | http://lloyd.caltech.edu/ | |
| Page House | Pageboys | Blue | Spe Labor Levis | http://www.ugcs.caltech.edu/~jrpage/ | |
| Ruddock House | Rudds | Navy Blue | http://ruddock.caltech.edu/ | ||
| Other | |||||
| Avery House | Purple and Silver | Creativity, Integrity, Tenacity | http://www.ugcs.caltech.edu/~avery/ | ||
History and Traditions
Blacker House
Blacker House (or Blacker Hovse) is one of the eight undergraduate houses at Caltech. It was built in the 1920s with the help of funds donated by Robert Roe Blacker, a trustee of Caltech. Members of Blacker House are referred to as moles.
One of the traditions of Blacker House is the Hellride. In a defiant response to the prohibition against playing The Ride of the Valkyries, and to the constant announcements of fake Ditch Days by seniors, the freshmen living in a part of the House named Hell (so called for its unbearable heat in the summer and cramped quarters) would announce a Hellride. They then barricade the hallway and play The Ride at high volume, daring the upperclassmen to break in and drag everyone to be drenched in the showers.
Blacker house features halls painted as Heaven, Purgatory and Hell. In Hell, an elevator switch is rigged to cause a red light to flash the prime numbers with the speed determined by the switch setting. Blacker also features a courtyard complete with a habitable treehouse and a giant tire swing, which daring house members can use to swing over a courtyard fire.
The war cry of Blacker House is γδβγ (Greek letters for gdbg, or God Damn Blacker Gang). The story is that in the 1978 or 1979, it was popular for Blacker students to climb on top of elevators and ride them. One time, security went inside the elevator looking for the students, who were on top of the elevator. The security muttered, "God Damn Blacker Gang", and the name stuck. Blacker students began signing GDBG or γδβγ on all their pranks.
Dabney House
Dabney House (or Dabney Hovse) is one of the four original (South) undergraduate student houses at Caltech. Dabney is the smallest of Caltech's Houses. Residents of Dabney House are referred to as Darbs.
Dabney House, as part of the single building that makes up the four "South Houses," was constructed in the 1930 and 1931. It has been known as the House of Gentlemen and the House of Captains, but it underwent a dramatic change in personality in the 1960's. In 1973, the House was disowned by the Dabney family when students from Dabney House protested a presidential visit with a sign on the library with the simple phrase "Impeach Nixon." This event has been a touchstone for Darbs ever since. The house became associated with the hippie lifestyle, and in 1990 multiple Dabney House members were banned from campus housing for performing lewd acts in the house courtyard (an event known as "fipi").
Traditionally standing for "Dabney Eats It," the acronym DEI has come to be a badge of pride for Darbs. Besides naming the house's rec room after it and spreading it all across campus, Dabney alumni have made DEI a hidden code in the outside world. The letters can be seen in movies (most notably Real Genius) and video games (including GTA: Vice City and several Intellivision games). There are even stories of the trigraph making its way into space on JPL probes.
Fleming House
Fleming House (or Fleming Hovse) is one of the four original (south) student houses at Caltech. Fleming Hovse was built in the 1920s with funds donated by a number of people, and the name Fleming was chosen to honor Arthur Fleming, then the chairman of Caltech's Board of Trustees.
Members of Fleming Hovse are called Flems. The house color is Red. The motto, from the crest as commonly seen on house beer steins, is "Let the Deed Shaw." The house battle cry is "Go Big Red!" Another important maxim is "Flems stick together!"
The Fleming Cannon, a Caltech landmark, is fired to mark important events, such as the end of rotation, Ditch Day, the end of the year, and the graduation of the Fleming president. It is a thunderous noise that can be heard and felt all over campus. The Fleming Cannon was stolen by Harvey Mudd students in the early 1990's; however, as the cannon was essentially held ransom in a location precluding any possibility of a response from Fleming, the Harvey Mudd administration ultimately capitulated and forced the Mudders to return the cannon.
The physical layout of Fleming House includes rooms numbered 8.5 (formerly the RA apartment, now a triple) and π(pi).
Fleming House has traditionally been the athletic house, and has maintained a tradition of athletic excellence over the past decade. Both the Interhouse Trophy, awarded to the winner of the Interhouse Athletic Competitions, and the Discobulus Trophy, awarded to the winner of a king-of-the-mountain style, challenge-oriented series of competitions, have called Fleming home for the past 5 years.
Fleming maintains an extensive post-graduate network, and some members of Fleming are among the most successful of the Caltech graduate community.
Fleming has a strong rivalry with Page House. Flems refer to Page House solely as "pagesux." Both houses prank each other and include the other in initiations.
Lloyd House
Lloyd House is smallest of the three North Houses. The North Houses were constructed in 1960 with funds provided by the Lloyd Foundation and other donors. Lloyd House was named in memory of Mr. Ralph B. Lloyd and his wife, Mrs. Lulu Hull Lloyd. Mr. Lloyd was a member of the Board of Trustees of Caltech, 1939-1952. Members of Lloyd House are called Lloydies and the house color is gold. The motto is "I live and die for those I love."
House Government
Lloyd House is governed by a student-elected, student-run Executive Committee, or "Excomm," of 9 members: President, Secretary, Superintendent, Treasurer, Social Director, Athletic Director, and 3 representatives at large. The Social Director and Athletic Director are aided by the Social Team (5 members) and the Athletic Team (3 members). There are 8 Upperclass Counselors (UCC's) and various appointed positions, such as Librarian, Historian, Coke Pusher, and Pool Monkey.
Physical Layout
Lloyd House (Building #54 on the Caltech map) is located along the Olive Walk. The physical structure of Lloyd House is an "L"-shaped, two-story building. At the intersection of the two "legs" of the house are "Lower Crotch" and "Upper Crotch," which serve as communal lounge areas.
Lloyd is divided into seven alleys: Purple, Kaos, VI (Virgin Islands), Fingal's, Valhalla, Inferno, and Tropic. Each alley is decorated with theme-appropriate murals. Some key murals include: the expansive Purple mural in the theme of Japanese tsunami waves, the Escher mural in Kaos, the tropical mural in VI, the "Enjoy Crack" mural that mocks the famous Coca-Cola slogan and contains a reference to Alan Moore's graphic novel Watchmen, and the newly painted modern art in Tropic.
Famous Lloydies
Crippling Depression, a satirical comic strip that was published regularly in the California Tech, the student newspaper, was drawn and written by Lloydies.
Lloydies are known for their elaborate pranks. The classic prank of the 1961 Rose Bowl was pulled off by the "Fiendish Fourteen," members of Lloyd House. Flashcards that were intended to cheer for the Washington Huskies football team were changed to read Caltech. Every year, Lloydies climb onto the top of Millikan Library to construct the Lloyd Christmas Tree, a monumental structure of numerous Christmas lights strung together to resemble a 10-story Christmas tree topped with a 10-feet-tall "L." The latest prank was the pranking of MIT's prefrosh weekend, which is probably best attributed to Lloydies. The website www.caltechvsmit.com gives a synopsis of this particular prank.
A common folklore that has been passed down throughout the years is that of the Purple LSD lab. It has been said that sometime in the 70's, a group of chemistry majors living in Purple blocked off some of the alley for a special project. The product of their project, was dubbed "Lloyd-grade" LSD, to denote its extraordinary purity.
Famous Lloydies include those once known as Slayer, the Porno Master, and many others.
Page House
Upon the arrival of the North Houses in the 1960's, members of Ricketts house splintered off to populate the newly constructed Page House. Members of the house are known as Pageboys (even the women), and the house crest includes the "mechanical horse" with a banner reading spe labor levis, a Latin idiom meaning "May the work be light" (and is often followed by "And the drinks be heavy"). House construction was funded by J.R. Page, former vice president of the First National Bank in Los Angeles, and chairman of the Caltech board of trustees from 1943 to 1954. While Page lacks the architectural history of other houses, or the affluent contributions of benefactors, its large size plus popular social activities provide the house with a large influx of money heavily used for party construction, the purchasing of hot tubs left and right, and buying nice Christmas and end-of-year presents for the cleaning crew. The largest (room-wise) of the houses, Page has been home to KCAL, the Interhouse Roller Coaster, and also used its access to the basement so that Pageboys could cover the concrete with dry ice, a prank copied in the movie Real Genius.
In response to other houses quixotically claiming certain items to be off limits in regard to pranks (rendering them Non-RF-able), the Page House president at the time named that The President be unprankable as well. Not getting the joke, the Interhouse committee allowed it, and to this day, the only two items in Page House that cannot be the target of pranks are the craps felt and a poster of President Nixon. These items are theoretically stored in the upstairs Library, but in all likelihood, are in cold storage in some alum's attic. Keeping with Pageboy tradition, no one cares.
All student rooms in Page are doubles, with the exception of the Triple across from the Library, which was the former RA room before that was moved downstairs. According to house bylaws, the newly elected Page House president may choose to reside in the Triple as a double, or in any other room as a single. Other popular rooms include the "long doubles" upstairs and downstairs, and Page 201, which has easy access to the arcade roof between Page and Lloyd House, also known as The Bridge. The Library itself is Page House's greatest and most notorious landmark, and although its collection is always being removed to be recycled elsewhere, its contents are meant to reflect the works and contributions of contemporary Pageboys and all who pass through its hallowed halls.
Favorite Pageboy activities include grilling on The Bridge, champagne at Millikan to celebrate the end of quarter, and Intrahouse, in which all eight alleys in Page partake in the annual tradition of applying primer and painting pictures that are combination of funny and creepy and always rife with innuendo. The painting in between alleys 6 and 7 covers "the fruit wall", a favorite target for PVC-borne projectiles, particularly fruit which tend to vaporize on contact. In addition to Intrahouse, there is the annual Stranding Of the Freshmen ("It's coooold on Mount Wilson!"), the Wait Staff Initiation, and Grease Frosh, in which Pageboys make liberal use of Caltech's grounds and upkeep fund by selecting a designated freshman in each alley (referred to as that alley's Grease Frosh), who is then sent scampering about the Beckman lawn in the effort to evade upperclassmen who are trying to tackle an opposing alley's Grease Frosh before theirs are tackled. Pageboys then rinse themselves in Millikan Pond, producing a nice, visible Crisco and lard film on the lake surface, before finally rinsing off completely in the Fleming showers.
Page House had used the Lloyd showers after Grease Frosh up until 1996, when that practice stopped over concerns of causing herniated bladders in Lloyd presidents.
Ricketts House
Ricketts House (or Ricketts Hovse) is one of the four original (South) undergraduate student houses at Caltech. Its construction was funded by Louis Davidson Ricketts. Members of Ricketts House are called Skurves (or Scurves) due to a play on the similarity of the name Ricketts to the disease rickets and the fact that scurvy is another vitamin deficiency disease.
Ricketts traditions include fire related activities and the brakedrum. Prior to 2003, the Ricketts courtyard housed a large concrete firepot, in which massive fires were often enjoyed during cool Pasadena evenings. However, due to tightening of Pasadena fire codes and the Caltech administration's recent restrictiveness, the firepot was removed. The brakedrum is a contest between the freshman class and the sophomore class over ownership of the brakedrum.
Ricketts House was known for athletics and student government in the 1950s, but in the past decades Ricketts has been known less for these activities, and more for activities which push the motto "Take me as I am" to the limit.
Ruddock House
Ruddock House is the northernmost of the seven undergraduate houses at the California Institute of Technology. The House was constructed in 1960 in honor of Albert Billings Ruddock, the Chairman of the Caltech Board of Trustees. Approximately 175 Caltech undergraduates are members of the House, and approximately 90 reside in the House. Members of Ruddock House are nicknamed "Rudds." During the week, student waiters serve family style dinners in the dining room; one notable dinner tradition is the throwing of bread rolls. The hallways, referred to as "alleys" by undergraduates, are adorned with various murals including reproductions of M. C. Escher works, a Monopoly Board, Simpsons characters, and a two-story mural of an astronaut. This mural, called "The Spaceman" by Rudds, is based on a photograph of Ed White's spacewalk during Gemini 4. The painting was made completely by Phil Cormier ('79) in a day's worth of work. Interestingly, a few years later Rusty Schweikert, Jr. (who's father walked in space on Apollo 9) was elected house president. Another Rudd connected to the space program is Phillip Engelauf ('78), who later became a flight director at JSC.
OPI
After the unfortunate demise of a campus-wide undergraduate party tradition, Interhouse, Ruddock began the tradition of OPI. OPI, standing for either "Our Private Interhouse" or "(Our) Own Private Interhouse," traditionally occurs during the winter term of the academic year. One of the most notable aspects of the OPI is the amount of time and effort put into construction and artwork for the sets of the party. Recent years' preparations have included flooded hallways to represent canals in Venice and two-story constructions inspired by the Roman Colosseum and Mayan Temples.
Avery House
Avery House is part of the housing system at the California Institute of Technology, housing undergraduates, graduate students, faculty, and visiting guests. Due to renovation of four south houses, many undergraduates will be residing on the back lawns of Avery in trailers during the 2005–2006 year.
The jury is still out on a nickname for Avery's members. Everything from "Birds" to "Averoids" has been suggested, but the ultimate decision rests with the Avery Council and Rotation picks team.
A vocal segment of members of the on-campus houses refuse to recognize Avery as a House, although starting in the 2005–2006 school year, Avery will be part of the Rotation process and will house freshmen. This has led to a heated debate regarding Avery's importance to the Caltech community.
Many outside Avery and a faction within Avery maintain that this decision was driven mainly by faculty concerns and does not reflect the needs of the Avery community. But others agree with the move, pointing out that Avery's inclusivity will give freshmen a social alternative to sometimes overbearing traditions held dear by the other houses. By a 10-to-1 vote in May 2004, the Faculty Board approved the decision on a two-year experimental basis, though it is widely expected to become permanent. As Avery frequently refuses to participate in the traditions of Caltech, members of Avery have a reputation as "trolls" (members of the Caltech community who refuse to adjourn from studying alone for any social activity.) Despite Avery's formal status as a house, few undergraduates acknowledge them as such.
House Memberships
There are two ways to gain membership in a House: Rotate in at the beginning of one's frosh year, or become a member afterwards.
Rotation
Rotation is the process by which frosh choose (and are chosen by) the House they will be affiliated with. Upon first arriving at Caltech, the frosh are given a random room assignment in a random House, and then spend a week eating lunch and dinner in all of the Houses, getting an opportunity to meet people in all of the Houses. At the end of this week, the frosh rate (as of 2005) exactly five of the Houses on a scale of 1 to 10; based on this, and the opinions of the Houses' existing members, the frosh are placed into a House which will be their home physically and socially for the next few years. This selection process contains similarities to the fictional Sorting ceremony in Harry Potter.
Other Memberships
There is a second way to obtain membership in a House: apply at some point after Rotation. The process varies from House to House, but in general one makes an announcement at dinner to the effect of "I would like to be a member of <foo> House," and the House conducts a vote (the nature of the vote, again, varying). Some Houses (in particular, Blacker, Fleming1, Lloyd, Page, and Ruddock) have two tiers of memberships: Full members and social members. However, Page does not allow dual-full membership, therefore if you become a full member of Page you must give up any other full memberships. Anyone who rotates into the House is automatically a full member; individuals who would like to become members afterwards can choose between full and social membership. The relative difficulties in attaining full and social memberships differ from House to House, as do the relative privileges that each membership type affords; the only universal truths are that full membership is harder to attain than social, and that full members may live in House-associated property while social members may not.
External links
- the Interhouse Committee (IHC) - committee of the presidents of the Houses; plans and supervises Rotation and inter-House sports and activities
- House pages:
Footnotes
1: While Fleming nominally has social memberships, they consider all undergraduates to be social members automatically (and they don't require social members to pay dues). So in effect, Fleming does not have social memberships. The same is true of Dabney.