Fri 2 Nov 2007
This is my penultimate Photo ID. So, relate any nice memories you have of this street.
Recall, for a moment, the first Photo ID almost three years ago, in which I explained what the Photo ID game would be about:
Here is how it works: I put up a picture taken somewhere on campus. You tell (a) Where it was taken or what it is of, and (b) stories about it from your time at Williams. Part (b) is optional, but it is what makes this game fun.
There has not been as much Part (b) as I originally hoped for, but I have had fun posting the pictures, and I hope that you have enjoyed them, too.
November 2nd, 2007 at 8:07 am
The first movie date that my lovely wife and I went on was The Princess Bride at Images, which I can’t quite make out at the lower left in this picture of Spring Street. She was certain that a hopeless romantic like me would love it. She was right.
More? If Diana wants memories, let’s give her memories! It is the least we can do after so many hundreds of excellent photos.
At the lower right was a restaurant, whose name I now forget but which was located about where Subway is now, where Kay and I would have a weekly lunch date, on Mondays at 2:00. (Regular dates with the Eph woman in your life are highly recommended.) The date was late in the day because she had a class and I had to give a tour with the marvelous Blair Newton (now Jones) ‘89. I loved giving tours, telling everyone how wonderful Williams was, and then heading off to meet my how-can-she-be-so-pretty girlfirend. I was a senior without a care in the world. That was 20 years ago next spring. We always had nachos. They were excellent.
If you have enjoyed Diana’s pictures, you should share a memory too.
November 2nd, 2007 at 8:34 am
Memories from the ’50’s when I was admitted to the class of ‘58 and received an introductory copy of the Record. My hometown buddy could not get over the advt. for Cal King’s liquor emporium on Spring Street: “ALWAYS 5,000 CANS COLD BEER”. Cal King’s was next door to present Images. I never had one of those beers or nachos or any other college snack with Dave’s Mom to be who was 70 miles away at Mt Holyoke College, overdosing on chocolate ice cream cones at the College Grill. Happily, she did not know me as an undergrad.
November 2nd, 2007 at 8:47 am
My child is a first year at Williams so we started visiting this site last October to get a feel for the area. Your pictures have been a reminder of the sights of life that my favorite person is now seeing daily, and I thank you for them.
November 2nd, 2007 at 8:51 am
& I always loved going into the Post Office building (an essential component of a main street, and thank goodness Williamstown still actually has one on Spring Street, not relocated by some far away “facilities manager”). No trip to Williamstown is complete for me without buying a few postcards, writing them out to old Eph friends, and then popping into the P.O. to mail them. My favorite discovery about the building was that it has (or used to have - I’m not brave enough to test it) a wonderful echo. A three-year old I used to babysit taught me that one summer, and we made a habit of stopping by once a week to test the acoustics.
Another memory of Spring Street is from the early 70s. Someone had an antique fire engine out for the Amherst game. Dozens of us found handholds and clung on, joining the parade on Spring Street on a glorious crisp day. Williams won.
November 2nd, 2007 at 8:52 am
Memories?
1) A moose walking down Spring Street early one morning during Freshman Days (early September 1986)
2) I actually miss the old Papa Charlie’s, before they moved into the mini mall.
3) Colonial Pizza. I have a good friend who was put on Constantine’s “Do Not Deliver” list for no good reason. Constantine was the Pizza Nazi long before Seinfeld gave us the Soup Nazi.
4) Hiding from the actors and their tourist audiences the summer I spent in Williamstown. Spring Street turns into Islip, New York on summer afternoons.
November 2nd, 2007 at 10:47 am
Diana, good luck in your endeavours. The communication of my memories will be limited to pointing to Diana’s many wonderful photographs themselves since I don’t want to become vulgar or sordid or both by relating my undergraduate experiences.
November 2nd, 2007 at 10:49 am
My student is a freshman at Williams so I have been there twice now…just recently for Parents Weekend. It is such a beautiful town and campus and with the trees in full Fall color it was perfect.
What surprises me is that the snowflakes hanging over the srteet would indicate Christmas and yet there is no snow. It must be fun when the first snow blankets the area!
November 2nd, 2007 at 12:20 pm
Thank you, Diana, for the gifts of the pictures.
Fare well.
November 2nd, 2007 at 12:46 pm
mom: Just you wait!
November 2nd, 2007 at 12:56 pm
Oh, there will be a semi-permanent layer of snow covering all walkways soon enough.
November 2nd, 2007 at 1:21 pm
Spring Street in the ’50’s, what a stroll … The House of Walsh and The Williams Co-op- both with more tweed and silk ties than you can imagine today, the grim Gym and Mikes for pre-franchise fat, two drugstores-one with a soda fountain where a Boston Cooler (root beer float) was 15¢, the shoe store for those Jack Purcell’s, Cal Kings where a case of Gannset was $2.99, the post office, the bookstore, the movie theater where response to the screen was mandatory, Rudnick’s laundry, the Williamstown Bank, the service station down at the end. Three ways of getting to it: straight down Spring from Rt 2 at the Congo Church, cut down from the lab campus, or rappel down the trail behind Lawrence- as an art history major, my preferred way. A virtual reality panorama ran across the back of eyes when I saw the Christmas photo.
November 2nd, 2007 at 1:35 pm
I join the others and say “Thank you, Diana” for all the wonderful photos. Since I’m not, unfortunately an eph myself — just the parent of a fortunate one — my memories are very recent: many walks up and down Spring St., stopping in at Helen’s Place, Harrison Gallery and Goff’s, and the too-sweet (but just right at the same time) chocolate truffle cake at Tunnel City. (And calling Royal Treet’s to make sure they won’t discard the dry cleaning my eph’s been “too busy” to stop by and get [they claim to have kept things for five years or more, hoping that ephs back for reunion will remember to come in].) I’m very much looking forward to my next visit (maybe I’ll pick up the laundered items when I’m there).
November 2nd, 2007 at 1:51 pm
Dick, your Spring Street of the ’50s was much more like mine from the early ’70s than the Spring Street of today is. Thank you so much for the memories.
November 2nd, 2007 at 1:56 pm
Dian,a will there really be an “ultimate” photo ID picture from you? Let’s start working on a new concept: “post-ultimate.” We’ll hope you’ll continue to grace us with your photos from time to time in the future.
November 2nd, 2007 at 2:01 pm
I got your memories right here, Diana!
1) Freshman year, a group of us crossed a picket line to go see “The Last Temptation of Christ” at the old Images theater.
2) When St. Pierre (the barber shop) moved from its location at one end of the street to the other end, they posted a sign on the old storefront that said that they moved two blocks north but were “still only 3 hours from Fenway Park!”
3) I spend the summer between my jr and sr years learning to knit at the yarn store that was located where Ephorium is now.
4) I bought my dress for the Sr Days party (what was that called?) at the antique store–for $10! I still have it.
and of course:
Clarksburg cheddar cheese bread and peanut butter pillows!
November 2nd, 2007 at 2:41 pm
Pappa Charlie’s is still there - Colonial Pizza moved to the mini-mall on Route 2.
November 2nd, 2007 at 2:50 pm
Thanks to all for the memories and the kind words. I do think the memories are the most fun part of Photo IDs, and one of the best parts of EphBlog.
1:56 PM: Yes, “penultimate” means “next to last,” and accordingly there will be a last picture next Friday, #100. A hundred seemed like a nice number to end on. In terms of future pictures, Abby is a new student who will take over putting up current pictures, as she has already been doing occasionally. I will most likely continue to put up pictures when it seems appropriate.
November 3rd, 2007 at 3:23 am
Spring street, straight after some christmas decorating. Memories– playing in the middle of the street during the Valentines day blizzard of 2007. I may have had a midterm but we didn’t care. I’m taking a sem off and this picture makes me pretty sad… but it is quite lovely.
November 4th, 2007 at 6:33 am
The year was 1976, and I started hanging out on Spring Street. “The Street” was two ways, with Arts gas station at the bottom for a good turn around spot. At that time there were two Pizza places on “the Street”. There was Colonial Pizza at the top of The Street (owned by Constant ream, as the townies called him then) and the Pizza house (towards the bottom of The Street) where Subway now is. I believe it may have been the slippery banana when you ate there with your wife on The Street, David.
… The Purple Pub just off of The Street was a new bar.
The Street teamed with townies. The gym on The Street had not been expanded, and the field now next to Papa Charlies was an open spot where people sat getting high. Fast cars cruising and kids boozing and partying. Nova Super Sports, Chevelle Super Sports, GTO’s, Trans AMs….Camaro… Ford or Chevy? It was alive. The first time I made out with a girl I was sitting on the steps at the top of The Street. Everyone would meet “on The Street” and then move out to party at other venues. “More than a feeling” and “Show me the way” blared on 8 tracks… I spent the next eight summers “hanging out on The Street.”
November 4th, 2007 at 6:37 am
The first time I told my wife I loved her, I was sitting in a car with a close friend, talking to her as she leaned in my window… just down from the Pub, on “The Street”.