UCLA FIRSTS Every other Friday, The Bruin will
highlight social, political and scientific advancements that
originated at UCLA and set standards for both the university and
the nation.
By Dharshani Dharmawardena
Daily Bruin Senior Staff
For most students, college means freedom, but during the early
1960s, a female student returning to the residence halls past
midnight on a school night would be locked out of her dorm.
In 1963, then associate dean of students Nola Stark Cavette
defended this stringent policy of “closing hours” for
women residence halls in the February-March issue of UCLA Alumni
Magazine.
Lockout “doesn’t mean what it says ““ at least
not on the UCLA campus,” she wrote. “If a girl returns
after closing hours, she finds the door locked and must ring the
doorbell for the late proctor.”
According to Cavette, whose official title was “Dean of
Women,” a judicial board then considered the reason for
tardiness, either dismissing the case or issuing her a warning.
During this time of separating the sexes and strict curfews for
women, Clarence Dykstra Hall, completed in 1959, became the
nation’s first co-ed dormitory in 1960.
Courtesy of University Archives Two studious male students
occupied this Dykstra room in the 1960s. Back then, the top floors
of the hall were female-only, while men lived in the bottom
six.
For people in the UCLA community, the integration marked a
momentous occasion.
“Many just wanted to try it,” said 1962 alumna
Gloria Jacobs. “They thought the time had come and that it
would be good for women’s rights.”
Although Jacobs initially disapproved the concept, she said many
people on campus approved it.
“California has always been the trendiest, always changing
things, for the most part for the better,” Jacobs said.
“Everyone wanted to be part of that lifestyle.”
Before Dykstra Hall was built, UCLA only ran Mira Hershey Hall,
an all-female residence, because most students commuted to school
and did not need accommodations.
Others wishing to live near campus found housing in fraternity
and sorority houses and privately owned residence halls, according
to the UCLA General Catalogue of 1954-55.
For women, living in these establishments meant supervision even
away from their parents.
Robert Robinow, who graduated in 1960, recalled that lock-out
policies stifled many sorority members’ freedom.
CATHERINE JUN (left to right) Micah Ting,
Mark Ahn and Tracy Lou laugh in
one of Dykstra’s triple rooms. Residents still live in same-sex
rooms but
“We grew up with that system,” he said. “But
we were a little bit opposed to it because my wife lived in a
sorority.”
To avoid having to break curfew, Robinow’s wife would
spend the weekends with his family.
During the 1960-1961 academic year, Dykstra, originally meant to
house only men, began to accept women because of a lack of rooms at
Hershey Hall, hinting at future liberties for college women.
But integration did not mean living next door to male neighbors.
In its second year of operation, women only occupied the top three
floors of the building while men lived in the other six, according
to the 1961 UCLA Southern Campus Yearbook.
Although the idea of living in the same building as men stood
out as a revolutionary idea, women’s floors were designed
similar to sorority houses at the time, according to Alan Hanson,
director of residential life.
Sporting such names as Argo, Valhalla and Manhattan Houses, each
women’s floor in Dykstra participated in floor sports,
competitions and other activities, including floor government, and
went to proms.
While enjoying this social gala and togetherness similar to a
sorority house, women living in Dykstra also found some of the same
restrictions, including the lock-out procedures.
“This was based on a very old model, probably a sorority
concept,” Hanson said. “It had a negative effect in
several ways.”
Courtesy of University Archives Students and faculty chat over
coffee in a Dykstra Hall lounge in the early ’60s. Dykstra,
completed in 1959, was the first co-ed residence hall in the
nation.
Although women had curfews, men could come and go as they
pleased.
“They were applying a different standard to men than
women. The reason it looked especially odd was that in Dykstra, men
were not locked out,” Hanson said.
“We wanted to make some changes,” he added.
With the changing times of the 1960s, which saw much advancement
in civil rights issues, the lock-out procedure at Dykstra
ended.
Complete integration, where both men and women co-habited the
same floors, occurred in the early 1970s, Hanson said.
Students can still live on same-sex floors today, but it is not
a requirement.
Presently, Dykstra residents continue to occupy the 40-year-old
building, along with the added noise of construction and
over-crowded rooms.
Carol Vitali, a first-year undeclared student and Dykstra
resident, said floors continue the highly social traditions started
in the early 1960s.
But she said she could relate little to the concept of
sex-segregated floors.
“I think it would be weird, like Catholic school
segregation,” she said.
To Vitali, learning that Dykstra was originally built to house
men cleared up one mystery, though.
“That explains why there are urinals in the girls
restroom,” she said.
With reports from Barbara Ortutay, Daily Bruin Senior Staff.