'Cheap' Computers of 1984: About $2,000

Every week, The Crimson publishes a selection of articles that were printed in our pages in years past.

September 12, 1951: A Friend of the Students

"Harvard students have been giving me the business for 29 years," reports Benny Jacobson, Harvard Square's King of Kleaning. Benny is a self-admitted "University personality," and few would contest the point. Owner of the Gold Coast Valeteria at 30 Plympton Street, this former second-string halfback for Boston English High School is one of the biggest supporters of the Crimson football team.

Benny takes a personal interest in all of Gold Coast's 3,500 customers and is very anxious to get to know all of the new students entering this fall. "I used to visit the new men in their rooms, but now I ask them to drop by the Gold Coast so that they can see how we do business." Benny remains silent about his benefactions, but there are countless happy graduates, leading successful lives today, who Benny got out of jams while in College.

September 15, 1975: Dean Arthurs Finds Radcliffe a Harvard Home

Alberta Arthurs has only herself to blame for the fact that she is leaving her post as dean of the now-extinct Radcliffe Office of Admissions, Financial Aid and Women's Education to assume the deanship of Harvard's new Office of Undergraduate Affairs. After all, Arthurs has been hard at work for the last two years preparing the scenario for her own exit. Voicing her views "very noisily" on the Strauch Committee, Arthurs pushed for an admissions policy that would make her own Byerly Hall bailiwick superfluous. Now, with equal access and merged admissions offices a reality, she is sadly saying goodbye to what she calls "an independent, autonomous, happy office."

September 10, 1980: A New Varsity Takes the Plunge

"It's a first for everybody." So says senior John Hansen, co-captain and one of the prime movers behind Harvard's latest varsity sport—water polo.

For the first time this year, the men's water polo team—elevated from club status last April—will compete at the full varsity level. The years of borrowing cars for road trips, struggling to fill out a schedule with often mediocre teams and rallying friends to come out for the game are over.

"It's going to make a difference," promises rookie coach Stephen Pike, who served as adviser to the water polo club for the last two years. "There's going to be more of a commitment to water polo."

September 10, 1984: Harvard, IBM Offering Cheap New Computers

In the University's third cut-rate compiler deal in less than a year, Harvard and the International Business Machines Corporation (IBM) have linked up to provide top-of-the-line computer's to students and staff at up to 35 percent off standard retail value.

Three IBM computers—the PC, the PC/XT, and the PC Portable—are now available from the Equipment Management Store on a first-come-first-served basis, officials said.

Earlier this year, Harvard struck deals with the Apple Computer Company and the Digital Electronics Corporation (DEC), under which the companies provide students with some of their best-selling models at similar reductions.

—Compiled by Nicholas P. Fandos and Julie M. Zauzmer