Minute by Minute: A Day in the Life of John Harvard
No wonder John Harvard looks just a tiny bit smug as he gazes out over Harvard Yard. Tourists travel from all over the world to rub his burnished foot. FM reports on a day in the life of Harvard’s most “decorated” celebrity.
10 a.m.: A blond woman in a neat pantsuit gestures at Hollis, and 30 or 40 elderly visitors murmur appreciatively. Thoreau and Emerson lived there? My, my. “Now we’ll head back to the coach and continue our tour with other historic sites of Boston,” chirps the tour guide, herding her charges south out of the Yard. As they leave, French native Marie-Christine translates the “three lies” for her elderly relatives.
10:30 a.m.: Seven Japanese women take turns posing at the statue’s base. One woman squints at the tiny screen of her digital camera, no doubt trying to fit the top of Mr. Harvard’s head in the frame. Robin and Todd, a young couple from San Diego, say that they came to Harvard to see the historic architecture. But what does Robin think about Harvard’s other sights—namely, its male population? Before she can answer, Todd chimes in with “Hey, you can’t have it all. You can’t have looks AND brains.”
1 p.m.: Twenty-two Guatemalans, on their way to the World Tae Kwon Do championships in Maine, are in Boston for the day. Do they know what Harvard students really do to that statue? Juan Fernando’s eyebrows shoot up. “No toque!” he barks at the kids posing for pictures. Santiago, 15, would like to study electrical engineering at Harvard. “Is it hard?” he asks. “Do they give a lot of homework?” Clearly he was hoping for an answer other than the one he got. “Oh,” he frowns. “Well, I suppose it is good that it is hard.” Still, he doesn’t sound convinced. Devon G. Castillo ’07 threads his way through the crowds in front of the statue. “It does get a little annoying when they all cluster,” he says.
1:30 p.m.: The elderly tour groups may be impressed by Emerson and Thoreau, but what Shelley and Leslie, of Baton Rouge, Louisiana, really want to know is where Conan O’Brien ’86 lived. “We’re on the Conan O’Brien Freedom Trail,” they giggle. They are less impressed with the male eye candy, however. “Well, I saw one kind of hot guy,” says Shelley doubtfully. “But I think they’d be hotter at Northeastern.” They imagine Harvard guys partying “in white tuxedos, not having keggers or anything.” As Shelley and Leslie leave to pose in front of Holworthy, O’Brien’s freshman dorm, José and his wife Eliza, of Montevideo, Uruguay, stand in the Yard in contemplative silence. They’re awed by Harvard’s size. “I went to university, but ours are small—one building only,” says José, an engineer. Jimmy, a tall, hearty man in a blue windbreaker and his family have come all the way from Colorado. Have they heard about the statue’s dirty secret? “Don’t they, um, defecate on it?” his wife Cheryl offers timidly.
3 p.m.: Nick, 16, of Philadelphia, isn’t just here to sightsee. “Is Harvard competitive?,” he asks gravely. He carries a businesslike legal pad and wears an intent expression as he walks through the Yard with his father in tow. A high school junior, Nick is on the familiar college tour, squeezing Harvard in between visits to Brandeis and Yale. Rose and Shirley are looking much more excited. The two women, both from Virginia, have put in their time at the Coop. “I got six Harvard sweatshirts!,” crows Rose. She’s not keeping them all—they’re for her kids and grandchildren.
4 p.m.: Sheri, Cassie, Carrie, Colleen and Michelle, a group of sisters and cousins from Illinois, seem to know college kids better than most tourists. When asked whether they knew about John Harvard’s midnight showers, one immediately bursts out, “TOLD YOU!” Another muses, “I wonder what it would be like to wake up every morning and say to yourself, ‘I’m at Harvard.’ Do you do that?”