Gilman Memories

posted 11.10.08

Somewhere on the upper reaches of this cavernous building lies the Tudor and Stuart Society room, home to a variety of items (including one of Samuel Clemen's fishing poles). I remember being taken to this room after induction into the society, but cannot recall vows spoken, promises made or classmates with whom I shared this experience. Can anyone flesh out the details of Tudor and Stuart, including whether it remains to this day, and what (if anything) was our charter?

Jonathan D. Krant, MD, FACP
jkrant@vgernet.net
A&S '76, SHPH '83

posted 11.10.08

Oh, Gilman! That beautiful monster was more my home than any other place at JHU. I was a Hutzler Regular--smoking side, not the nerd non-smoking wing. I fell joyfully in and painfully out of love there. Lived on vending machine food through 48 hour straight reading, writing, and exam studying binges. Had the privilege and pleasure of a few wee hours discussions with Prof. Macksey when he'd breeze in to check a reference or to make a copy before dawn. I knew every inch of the place from the Tudor & Stuart club, with it's Spenser and fly fishing collections, to the maze of the basement, and just about every unlocked (or unlockable) window, back stairway and hall between (how else to get snacks at 3 a.m.?). It was, after all, my and my friends' home. I still remember the curves of the worn, cupped marble steps, the first unsteady, then gentle, familiar way they felt under foot.

Seeing the photos of Gilman, particularly of the Hut, denuded for renovation, feels like watching debridement of burns or a bone being re-set--not pretty or pleasant, but necessary. I hope this great beast's character, its mystery and intimacy won't be lost in the renovations. I especially hope that the Tudor & Stuart Club and the crystal chandeliers in the commons will be restored and that the Hut will again be home to students and professors whose companionship and love of learning are active 24/7. I'm waiting with bated breath to see the sun rise through the printers' mark windows again.

—RJB A&S '79

posted 11.10.08

Working as a student library assistant in Donovan Hall, then (1959-'63) known as the Goodwillie Room. Among other things, it housed the Serials Department of the Library.

My job involved a variety of library administrivia, including collating and assembling periodicals for binding, researching catalog entries, retrieving bound volumes from the stacks and shelving new ones, and filing new cards in the card catalogs.

The work took me all over Gilman Hall (as well as Ames, Remsen, Mergenthaler, Rowland, Latrobe, and Maryland Halls as well--the other buildings now cluttering the campus weren't there yet). The retrieving and reshelving gave me entry into the Gilman stacks, a rare privilege at that time because undergraduates weren't allowed back there.

Probably my best "Gilman memory" was a young Peabody graduate named Carole Billings, working a "day job" as the secretary to Bill Gordon, the Serials Librarian.

We'll have been married for 40 years in December.

—Ralph Lohmann '63

posted 05.20.08

I remember taking Number Theory sophomore year in the basement of Gilman hall. Our classroom had a pet, a little mouse we named "Gauss the Mouse". Gauss the Mouse lived behind the noisy radiator in our classroom, and every now and then, when our class discussions got especially exhilarating (which was often, everyone knows Number Theory is a thrill!) Gauss the Mouse would peek out and let his presence be known! Unfortunately, Gauss didn't make it to the end of the semester...luckily, Gauss's sister, Apo, (short for Apolipoprotein, she was a little chubby from snacking on scraps from the Gilman Hall Coffee Cart) lived in the Hut and kept us company during our late night Biochem cram sessions.

—Elizabeth Holcomb, ’03

posted 05.20.08

So very many hours spent in the HUT, most of them good, a few quite surreal, almost all in the company of good friends. Being in the space always seemed to lift our spirits and keep us going even when the prospects seemed bleakest. Thanks for the memories.

—Louis Brill, '95

posted 05.01.08

...sitting on the marble steps in front on a beautiful spring day, scribbling in an exam 'blue book'... in those days, thanks to the honor system, you could leave the classroom during exams and work outside.

...hiding in one of Gilman's massive toilet stalls, trying to regain my composure before humiliating myself, again, in my intro German class.

—WA, ’68

posted 03.19.08

The Tudor and Stuart Club somewhere up under the eaves. You needed a door key to get in. A great secret hideaway and beer was available with visiting lecturers. Does it still exist?

—RWB, ’47

posted 02.29.08

The clanging pipes in the basement level classrooms, which were always oppressively hot. The musty smell of books in the halls, particularly the interior corridors of the humanities dept. The spiral staircases that showed such wear and tear, they appeared to carry the weight of the entire building. Spending countless hours in the HUT cramming for midterms and finals. I never did walk over that seal in the lobby until I graduated.

—JRM, ’98

posted 02.29.08

When I toured Gilman as a high school senior, I remember thinking I would never be able to figure out the circular staircases at the corners, with the entrances never on the same level as the building's floors. I did get the hang of them after only a few weeks, but even better, I still remember the sweet thrill of accomplishment (sometime my junior year?) when I finally mastered the interior staircases. These were the ones that connected only certain floors, and it seemed you could only find them every other Tuesday and odd-numbered Thursdays, if it was raining, and you were wearing green shoes. To this day, I still have dreams about Gilman Hall and staircases!

—Jenn Pugh O'Connor, ’92

posted 01.08.08

There are a couple of things that I will always remember about Gilman Hall.

The first thing that comes to mind is that, in the women's restrooms, the water in the toilets was always hot — you could see water vapor rising from the bowls, the water was so hot. I always thought that was the weirdest thing.

I have fond memories of Gilman 18, which was a Writing Sems classroom when I was at Hopkins, so I took many classes there. I always enjoyed late spring classes when we had to open the windows to cool the room, and the room was filled with the smell of freshly cut grass and the promise of summer.

The best memory, however, was walking through the halls of Gilman one last time to return my graduation gown in the days after the graduation ceremony — the exhilaration and pride I felt is still unmatched in my life today.

— ESK, ’01

posted 01.05.08

Making snowmen in front of Gilman, and then using Gilman's marble
steps as a high point during a snowball fight on the Upper Quad
(Winter 2006)

— KB, ’09

I was late to my French class on the fourth floor and students would be hanging out the window yelling “Hurry up, hurry up! He’s about to begin.” … and I would race up those wonderful old, worn marble steps. I still remember it as if it were yesterday.

— Ross Jones ‘53