Weekend Warriors: Club Treks To See Siamese Skeletons, Murder Sites

Bored with the typical weekend routine of getting drunk at parties, studying deep in the stacks of Widener Library, or watching reruns of “The O.C.,” one freshman hopes to offer his classmates experiences that are more out of the ordinary—such as examining old skulls or touring a haunted bed and breakfast.

Tim R. Hwang ’08 started a group dubbed The Transit Club on thefacebook.com over winter break dedicated to finding quirky and unique places to visit in the Boston area and beyond. The club took its first two trips this weekend, and although only Hwang’s roommate and one other member turned out for the excursions, the group has 50 online members and its founder says he hopes the idea will catch on.

On Friday, Hwang and his roommate crossed the Charles River to the Longwood Medical Campus to visit the Warren Anatomical Museum, located in Harvard’s Countway Library of Medicine. Among its array of medical artifacts, the museum boasts the first ether inhaler, a skeleton of Siamese twins, and the skull of Phineas Gage—a railroad worker who experienced severe personality changes after a nail went through his frontal lobe.

For the group’s second trip on Saturday, member Jonathan I. Sasmor ’07 joined Hwang for a visit to the Mapparium, a huge inverted glass globe at the Mary Baker Eddy Christan Science Library in Boston.

Hwang says the concept for the group originated when he got together with his friends from other colleges over winter break and heard them repeat the same stories about their weekends.

“I’d rather say I saw Phineas Gage’s skull or a castle this weekend than that I woke up in a pool of my own vomit on someone’s floor,” he says. “There’s also an interesting thing about traveling and going to somewhere new.”

Hwang says he finds that the “social outlets at Harvard are narrow,” and he wanted to find a way to hang out with friends and classmates in a setting other than a crowded room party. He plans his trips using ideas from Curious New England, a book with odd and offbeat destinations in the Northeast, and asking other members for recommendations.

He chose to create a thefacebook.com group because he saw the site as a good way to “collect a lot of people and to get the message out about trips,” he says.

The name “Transit Club” came from Hwang’s fascination with the “T” symbol for the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority (MBTA). Hwang, who hopes to concentrate in Sociology and Government, says he enjoys people-watching on the subway. He adds that the name also “comments on the fact that getting there is seventy percent of the fun.”

Sasmor says he enjoyed the trip to the Mapparium, which he called “an interesting historical work of art.”

“It was cool to get out and see Boston,” he says.

Hwang says he hopes in the future to visit a series of castles built by eccentric millionaires in Maine. Another planned destination is the Lizzie Borden Bed and Breakfast in Fall River, Mass., the home where a couple was murdered in 1892. According to the bed and breakfast’s website, the Bordens’ daughter Lizzie was accused of the crime and later acquitted, and the home has been converted into a hotel that invites visitors to stay in the room where the killings occurred-“if you dare.”

Hwang also has an upcoming winter beach party planned at Revere Beach. And although the club’s original purpose was to visit offbeat and bizarre locales, he says he may include trips to destinations that are not as far off the beaten path, such as the Museum of Fine Arts.

“Breaking up regulated time with something surreal never hurt anyone,” Hwang says. “What happened to the days of yesteryear when college students had adventures?”