Swing Late, Sweet Gates

With due regard for the Middle Ages, the days of walled towns and the portcullis should long since have ended. But every night the College's foremost medievalists keep alive the tradition. At 10 p.m. the University policemen clang shut two of the three gates leading into the Yard from Massachusetts Avenue. After that hour Lamont Library stands as a besieged fortress, nearly isolated from the Houses because of an outmoded regulation. House-bound students must trudge all the way to the Holyoke or Quincy Street exits before they can return to Plympton Street--the logical path to Adms, Leverett, and Dunster.

If the Wigglesworth archways were dark hideaways, locked gates would be justified. But instead, they are clean, well-lighted places, which are quite safe at night. The University police contend that closed gates deter thieves from raiding the nearby entries of Wigglesworth by restricting their routes of escape. In the long run to the Holyoke Street, exit, alert proctors would have time to make the tackle. Yet with Lamont open until midnight, homeward-bound students would keep the archway patrolled, forcing burglars to postpone their raids until later.

Last winter the University police advanced the gate-shutting hour from 8 until 10 p.m., the former closing time of the libraries. Now that Lamont operates until 12, the gates should stay open until midnight too.