The Hounds of Spring

"They have a good time, that Princeton crowd," mused New Jersey Governor Richard J. Hughes as a barrage of cherry bombs blitzed the gubernatorial front lawn. That Princeton crowd, a mob of 1,500 students, was launching the 1963 Intercollegiate Spring Riot Season by burning benches, smashing railroad cars, tipping Volkswagens, and rending fences. Then off to nearby Westminster Choir College, where from dormitory windows some of the girls defended their honor by tossing out panties and others by tossing out potted plants. When the bonfires cooled next morning, 14 of Princeton's fiercest Tigers were booked and bailed. "Shocking," said Princeton President Robert F. Goheen. whose wrought-iron fence was shorter by 30 ft. after the rumpus. Philosophized Governor Hughes: "It's spring, and the sap begins to run." The annual undergraduate sugaring-off rites scorched the ivy elsewhere in the league. At Yale, tipped-off police hoped to forfend a fracas by locking the freshmen inside the Old Campus. But the freshmen broke out, chanting "We want sex, we want sex," as they streaked for a dormitory occupied by women graduate students. The graduate girls peered out the windows and smiled tolerant, grownup smiles. Then the demonstrators headed for New Haven's Taft Hotel where police resorted to billy-whacking and pistol-packing to herd them back to Old Eli. Score: 17 arrested, one hospitalized. In Providence, the vernal urge for lingerie led marauding Brown University students to congeneric Pembroke College. Said Dean Rosemary Pierell: "It's the first time in 16 years that a horde of Brown men has managed to reach the upper floors of a Pembroke dormitory." It took Providence police with Birmingham-type dogs to quell the brouhaha elsewhere in town. Eight Brown rioters were arrested, but the chief injuries were sustained by two policemen and a bystander. One cop was hit with a rock and the other suffered the unkindest cut of all: he was bitten by his own dog.

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