Every year at about this time, the summer pace on campus abruptly quickens. Although preparation for the fall semester begins literally the day after May Commencement, our focus becomes more intense in early August. We will soon be the academic home of 6,500 students, some 4,300 of whom will also live on campus. 

With all respect to the sophomores, juniors, seniors and graduate students, there is inevitably a special excitement about the incoming freshman class. The first year of college is one of the great transitions in life, both for students and their families. For the class of 2014, freshman year is about to begin, a year they are destined to remember – in great detail – decades from now. 

One of the magical elements of our campus is that students come together for a common purpose but bring with them an incredibly diverse array of backgrounds. Among the members of the Class of 2014 are Leroy Tindi of the Bronx, a computer science major who developed an online database inventory system that he presented at a national education computing conference. He will be joined by Emily Park of Austin Texas, a Cinema & Photography major who had one of her photographs published on the cover of a textbook used at the University of Texas. Abby Sophir will be here, a TV-Radio major from St. Louis who won the Jim McKay Memorial Scholarship. This scholarship, named in honor of legendary sportscaster Jim McKay, was awarded by the National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences in recognition of Abby’s “exceptional talent as a creator of video programming as well as outstanding academic achievement and potential for success.” 

The class of 2014 includes Nicholas Tweedy of Fort Hood TX, who served as a land combat electronic missile systems repairer for the US Army before coming to Ithaca to study in our School of Business. One of the shortest trips to campus will be made by Amber Capogrossi, valedictorian at nearby Newfield High school, who also found time to compete in varsity volleyball and track, play at the New York State Music Association Solo Festival, and serve as president both of the student council and her senior class. 

The class of 2014 includes students who have won a first place medal in the International Thespian Society’s Regional Conference, have written an admission essay on advances in stem cell research, have tutored their peers in mathematics and science, and have served as their high school’s athletics mascot. Actually, we will be joined by one student who did all of those things: Roger Dunkelbarger of Evansville Indiana, who is majoring in Musical Theater.

The class of 2014 will have one student who almost had to back out earlier this year. Michela Moe of Kihei, Hawaii, won the Miss Maui beauty pageant and became eligible to compete for the title of Miss Hawaii. She wrote to us in April with mixed feelings saying that if she won the Miss Hawaii title she would have to defer admission in order to enter the Miss USA competition. Sadly, perhaps, Michela did not go on to win Miss Hawaii, but she’ll have some great stories to tell when she arrives at IC to begin her Communication Management and Design program!

Cady Lang of Clayton California will come to IC to major in journalism. True to her field, Cady wrote an article in the Contra Costa Times on why she chose Ithaca College. She dreaded the idea of moving all the way across the country, and when she was invited to apply for a Park Scholarship she at first hoped she wouldn’t get it! Cady writes that “Fear of the unknown, whether it's experiencing life with snow or moving far away from home, should hardly be reason for shying away from opportunities. Although I still have misgivings about the cold weather in upstate New York and the distance from my family, … I'll glean satisfaction from knowing that I chose to attend a school that was right for me — snow and all.”

Cady’s words capture the hopes and dreams of all 1600 talented members of the class of 2014. Some will consider Ithaca’s winters to be cold and snowy, like Cady. Others will experience our winters as short and balmy, like Elyse Hornstein, a journalism major from Duluth Minnesota. But all will arrive with a suitcase full of hopes and dreams. And for all, their first year at Ithaca College will be an experience they will never forget.   

Ninety-nine and three-quarter years ago, in November 1910, Grant Egbert decided to purchase the Ithaca home of Judge Douglass Boardman, making it the architectural centerpiece of what was then known as the Ithaca Conservatory of Music.   As founding president of the Conservatory, Egbert understood a basic truth that we still appreciate today:  you cannot offer a quality education without quality facilities. 

The purchase price was steep for the fledgling conservatory. To buy the house it was necessary to borrow $11,400, with a further commitment of $7,000 in debt to renovate the building for its new purpose. But Boardman House proved to be a good investment, and for the next sixty years it served as the hub of Ithaca College’s downtown campus. For the first thirty of those years, it was known as the Music Building, where generations of students took their lessons. President Leonard Job moved his office there in 1943, and the house came to be known by postwar students as the Admininstration (or “Ad”) Building even though most of the rooms continued to be used for music lessons.

In the 1960s, as the College relocated to the present campus on South Hill, Boardman House had its third incarnation as the Ithaca College Museum of Art, home to exhibits by Paul Klee and Andy Warhol among others. Ithaca College closed the museum and sold Boardman House in 1972 after one final show starring the house itself, recreated in its full Victorian glory. 

Boardman House is just a few blocks from my home on Fountain Place, and I have often walked past while admiring its graceful columns and front steps. Earlier this summer, as I took a leisurely vacation-induced walk with my son Liam in his stroller, I noticed a small sign on the massive front doors: “Push to Enter.” That was all the invitation I needed to encounter Ithaca College history!

Truth be told, there is not a lot to see in Boardman House today. The building serves as offices for a number of attorneys, CPAs and counselors. Simply walking the hallways and going up and down the stairs, though, was enough to bring the ghosts of Boardman House fully to life. Grant Egbert walked these halls, giving instruction in violin and no doubt listening through the heavy doors to gauge the progress of students in other instruments. Here was Leonard Job’s office on the second floor, the place where he worked tirelessly to earn full accreditation for Ithaca College and where he dreamed about building a campus on South Hill. Howard Dillingham frequented these halls beginning in 1951 first as President Job’s assistant, then as his vice president, and finally as his successor. Mrs. Howard, the Dean of Students who took a personal interest in every student, had her office close to the front door on the first floor. 

Even more than the shades of those leaders who made Ithaca College what it is today, I could feel the presence of the students who practiced and socialized together. Here is the snack bar where Jack Holcomb, Vern Hinkle, Jim McKenna, and Jerry Rachmiel – all class of ’56 -- started the day with coffee and doughnuts. Jack reports that “my friends and I would often sit together in a booth and begin to harmonize with a barbershop tune or two.  [This wasn't] always appreciated by the music teachers [who] … would come down and remind us to leave the harmony to the pianists or violinists.”

Over there is the room where Willis Traphagen, now principal tuba at the Austin Civic Orchestra, would hide in the dark until Jimmy the custodian went home for the evening.  After Jimmy left, Will would turn on the lights and practice all night long. And here are the rooms where Jack Eaton ’53, Sandy MacDonald ’60, and so many other students took lessons from Frank Page, Craig McHenry, Walter Beeler, Joseph Tague, and others. Terry Patala ’52, remembers that she quivered with anxiety every week before and during her lessons with Frank Page. Fran Cicero (now LaPlaca) ’60 is still grateful that Professor Tague gave her a semester’s lessons in left-hand piano pieces after she cut her right hand on a water glass and could not use it for several months. 

That spot on the front lawn is where Arnie Heitz ’55 proposed to his wife Lee in December 1954. They married the next month and this past January celebrated their 55^th anniversary. 

And then there are those perfectly proportioned front steps and porch columns. It was on that porch that Walter Alexander ’53/MM ’60 sat as a freshman in 1949, waiting with other IC students for the start of his first orchestra rehearsal. His recollections match those of hundreds of IC students who sat before and after him on that same porch :

It was a clear fall day [and] … the grand wisteria plant that had woven its way around the pillars, over the doorway and across the bricks provided an idyllic setting. … I was … highly anticipating my first rehearsal with the IC Orchestra, and more than a bit awed by the upper class … orchestra members who were waiting there.  I was silent, listening to the banter, happy to belong as a newly minted IC student.

Walter’s memories continue with an unexpected twist. For his full recollection and those of other alumni who have written to me about Boardman House, please click on the sidebar.  You will also find below additional photos of the building and its snack bar, sent to me by alumni or taken from past issues of The Cayugan.

When I stand today on the grounds of Boardman House I hear the voices of alumni who remind me that I am only the temporary custodian of a grand tradition that has shaped the lives of thousands of students over the years. From the homey comfort of coffee and doughnuts for breakfast to the unforgettable moments in one’s first day at college, from the nerves that accompany performing for one’s professor to a proposal of marriage:  Boardman House is more than brick and mortar – it was for many years the heart of Ithaca College. 

And so, as we prepare to mark the 100^th anniversary of IC’s purchase of Boardman House, let’s celebrate the life-changing moments that have taken place there. During Alumni and Homecoming Weekend, this coming October 1-3, I am inviting every IC alum who attended classes downtown to have breakfast with me in my home on Fountain Place. After breakfast, we will ride (or walk) the few blocks to the old Administration Building, to share some old memories and create new ones with a group photograph.  Maybe we can evoke the spirits of Presidents Egbert, Job and Dillingham, as well as of Frank Page, Craig McHenry, Walter Beeler and all the others who taught and studied there!