Scripps Women Transcending Time

Within the corridors of Denison Library and seated beside the stone fireplace, time ceased to exist as two Scrippsies—Judy Harvey Sahak ‘64 and Victoria Davis ‘14—met to discuss the expectations and perspectives of past, present, and future Scripps women.

During your time as a Scripps student, what kind of an impact did body image have on campus?

I heard rumors of a girl who would eat all of her dinner and then return to her dorm—we ate in our residence halls then—to throw it up in the bathroom. It seemed strange to me, to a lot of people. It was really the only instance—of deliberately throwing up to not get ‘fat’—that I had heard of as a student because there was not a huge emphasis on the body. [Today] girls go to gyms and workout. There is pressure to be healthy and fit. [When I was a student] I did sports and had P.E., but there wasn’t the need to work out, slim down and have a perfect body.  Gyms? Prize fighters would go to gyms and bash their brains out. I wouldn’t have gone to a gym, for heaven sakes. Constant exercise was not of importance to us.

How did food affect the idea of female body image for past Scripps women?

Food just wasn’t a big deal. Today in 2011, no two people have the same lunch or dinner. When I was a student, meals were served in individual residence halls. Everyone had the same thing. For dinner, you had your meat, salad, vegetables, and a starch. That was it. Now, there are so many choices and temptations.  You go to [Malott] Commons, and there is so much variety: four options for soups, chicken, hamburgers, hot dogs, pizza, demonstrations, salads, stir fry, tofu—just all this food. I think there are so many issues that young women have today that we just didn’t know. We didn’t have the ubiquitousness of beautiful people everywhere you turn.

So past Scripps students weren’t as concerned with the idea of a ‘perfect’ body. Were students preoccupied with clothing styles or fashion trends?

In the early to mid ‘60s, what we wore was fairly conservative and restrained. There were rules. Clothes could not be revealing. We couldn’t wear shorts unless we were in the residence halls or on our way to a P.E. class. We wore dresses to class. If we had dress up parties, we wore our dress up clothes. But we weren’t even allowed to wear jeans to town. We were told what we could and couldn’t wear. No one [could] ever lie in front of Toll Hall in a bikini.

Yes, we do like to soak up the sun. That reminds me of a stereotype I’ve heard about Scripps women: there are three ‘types’ of Scrippsies; you have the very promiscuous Scrippsie, the social activist Scrippsie, and then the nerdy and studious Scrippsie. Were Scripps women stereotyped like this when you were a student?

As with all stereotypes, there was probably a bit of truth and a lot of legend in our images. Many Scrippsies were stereotyped by the residence hall they lived in. At Scripps, before there was the Hall Draw, students stayed in one dorm all four years, so I think that’s why the residence halls carried their own ‘typical’ personalities. Clark was where you could find the really good, serious, and studious students. Toll was sort of social, but the women were pretty well rounded. A lot of Toll residents were daughters of alumnae. Browning? Now talk about social and sophisticated! Kimberly housed your all-American and studious Scrippsie—like me. And Dorsey was where you could find your very Bohemian kind of Scrippsie. Dorsey was where you could find someone who would whip out [a pair of] bongos and start banging.

That sounds like something a Pitzer student would do! How did Scripps students in the past interact with other campuses? Did you have party scenes like those that exist on campus today?

Pitzer didn’t exist [when I was a student]. Back then there was nothing north of Foothill [Blvd.] but orange groves. On Friday afternoons, some Scripps students would go to the groves with students from CMC and Harvey Mudd to have small parties—TGIFs, thank goodness it’s Friday! Of course there might be a keg there because the drinking mainly went on off campus. There was no drinking on campus. We did have organized hall parties and seasonal dances, but no large 5C college parties like today. If anything, at CMC a small group of guys would get together and drink, but it was never as huge a crowd of people. CMC had two types of guys: there were the jocks and then there were the cool preppy guys. Within those groups, friends would have parties and it was mainly the guys who [drank]. I know that sexual practices today are much more casual, but when I was a student dating mostly consisted of two people going out, holding hands, and kissing. I’m sure women were sexually active: we heard of the occasional girl taking a semester off if she was pregnant—but it didn’t happen a lot. In the days before abortion was legal, if you were pregnant you had an illegitimate child and your family would be mortified.

So women weren’t very liberated sexually? What about a women’s role as a member of society? What did Scripps women expect of themselves after graduation?

Many Scripps students felt lucky to get engaged before they graduated. Women hoped to get married soon after graduation. If they could get engaged, they were set for the rest of their lives. If they could get married a year or two years after graduating, they had made it. Well, that’s just not true. It was so short sighted. But my class didn’t emphasize on that. In 1963, with the publication of the Feminine Mystique, the role of women and who a woman was meant to be began to change. The 60s and 70s absolutely changed everything. Marriage was not a career anymore. I was part of an era where everything was changing: what we could wear, what we should eat, what we could communicate. With the Vietnam War and student unrest, it gave people a voice. It was very liberating. Women were liberated. When I was in my senior year, I knew a Scripps woman who was going to law school and another classmate was going off to medical school. Even I was seen as a bit offbeat going on to graduate school to be a librarian. It was very unusual. Not many women did this.

That must have been amazing to be a part of such a monumental time of change. What was it like being a Scripps woman during such a revolutionary era? How has such change in what defines a woman affected your life?

Old constraints and expectations were just thrown off. We could forge a new reality. Without rules, we didn’t always know what to expect. It was a little more unsettling to create a voice for yourself. Many women found it a little scary, but it became a part of who you are. I believe the physical place [of Scripps] keeps you grounded. Today the campus is larger, the landscape is different, but it is still the same place. It’s the one constant amongst all Scripps students that keeps you centered. I loved being a student at Scripps.  Friendships, the community, and the beauty of the campus are amazing things to be exposed to during your education. When you go out into the world and you have to face the dirty grimy city streets, you can remember that there can be such beauty in the world.

Just to publicize and give more awareness to the Denison Library resources: Can you tell me about the rare book collections?

We have rare collections of books, manuscripts, letters, [among many other primary documents] that are owned by Scripps College and are housed here in Denison. It is important that students use creative and original research avenues. Denison’s goal is to integrate the rare collections into the curriculum: many Core III classes last semester, Core II classes, and even a senior writing her thesis have utilized the collections. [Though many of the collections are in the process of being made available online], the size of Scripps College truly gives students the opportunity to consult, investigate, and research closely such rare collections [at their fingertips].

Go to the Denison page on the Scripps website to find out more.