Illustration by Karina Fernandez
cornerstone
FSU is the Florida school usually associated with the word circus. However, when our College moved in 1955 from Building K, a World War II army barracks, to the more spacious digs underneath Florida Field’s west side, it found what can only be called a circus atmosphere.
First, there was the band, but I’ll get to that later. Then there were the wild animals. Yes, animals. Yes, wild. Students could hear rats scampering through the walls. It was not unusual to see a bat snoozing at the top corner of a doorpost. (These denizens of the dark later moved to the Lake Alice Bat House). Once or twice, a feral cat fell through a loose ceiling tile and had to be chased from the classroom by an instructor swinging a chair.
On the fourth floor, carpenters constructed an interior soundproof wall in one large room to provide a studio for WRUF. The exterior wall had a window, and at some point the window broke. On occasion, a pigeon flew through the window and could not get out, telecommunication Associate Prof. Sid Pactor recalls. The flapping against the interior wall lent unwanted sound effects to the radio programs.
Let’s take the circus analogy further. The eastern wall in most of the classrooms was slanted at a 45-degree angle, just like the ceiling of a tent – remember, stadium seats were overhead.
At the time, the College shared the stadium’s west side with the athletic dormitory. They were south; we were north. One day, according to communications law Prof. Emerita Jo Anne Smith, instructors could hear a sharp banging noise echoing through the long hallway on one of the floors. A golf team member had set up a board in the middle of the hallway to practice tee shots.
We not only had a quasi-circus in our halls of learning, we also had a real circus across the street once a year. Carni Gras, a traveling fair, would take over the ROTC drill field (later the O’Connell Center parking lot) for a week or longer. There were Ferris wheels, bearded ladies, tests of strength and other fairaphernalia. There were also carnival people, and when we came to work, we would usually find one or two sponging themselves in the sinks of our bathrooms. When Carni Gras struck its tents and departed, it usually left a half-inch layer of broken glass on the drill field to greet our cars.
Football made our offices almost uninhabitable five weeks a year. First, there was the band practicing for its weekend routine, playing the same tunes over and over again – Wednesday, Thursday and Friday afternoons. Then, on game morning, one could not squeeze through the grungy men blocking our stairs and using our electric outlets to blow up rubber alligators.
One football weekend, I had two Israeli friends visiting and took them to the game. At halftime, the Gator Marching Band strutted onto Florida Field and began its routine facing the student side. Halfway through the show, I turned to Itzik and Betty Lewin and said, “Since I’m a dean, I was able to request that the band play an Israeli song in honor of your visit to the campus.” Itzik responded, “You’re pulling my leg.”
At that point, the band about-faced and marched to the alumni section, where we sat. It struck up a ringing rendition of “Hava Nagila.” Itzik and Betty couldn’t believe it.
My secret? I had heard the band practicing “Hava Nagila” for three long afternoons that week, to a point where the repetition and loudness had nearly driven me bats.
