Records of the Director of Dormitories and Undergraduate Housing

The Records of the Director of Dormitories and Undergraduate Housing fill four archival boxes and one drop-front box. The materials are arranged in two categories: administrative files and building files. Although the files span the years 1937-1971, the bulk of the materials falls within the 1940s and 1950s.

The administrative files include requisitions for materials, furniture, and maintenance; decorating schedules, damage reports, work repair orders; summaries of operating costs and room capacities; internal memoranda and correspondence concerning fraternity leases; and correspondence regarding professional activities. Four volumes, titled "Housing Book" (1943-1968), record expenses relating to parties and events, and statements summarizing income from men's and women's housing fees, guest fees, special groups, and summer institute programs. The binders holding the "Housing Books" were removed and the contents placed in folders.

The administrative files and the building files contain requisitions, decorating schedules, building inventories, work repair orders, copies of leases, and internal memoranda regarding student's fees and charges that pertain to specific buildings.

Of particular interest are the decorator's sketchbook in Box 5, which contains floor plans, furniture sketches, fabric swatches, and price information for the decoration of Willard and Scott Halls (ca. 1938); and the file on emergency housing (Box 3, Folder 13), which shows how the University met the problem of the post-war campus housing shortage.