The History of FSU Clubs Through the Gatepost
My question for the many Gatepost articles was "What kinds of clubs existed back when these certain Gatepost articles were made, and what were they about?" My research into this question started out with the use of the Ngrams cloud. I first looked around the cloud that was generated for the top 100 terms within the articles. The words that stood out to me were “club” and “clubs,” so I entered “club” into the Ngram search to see what other terms related to it. Three main clubs then popped up in the terms: the Fine Arts club, the Home Economics club, and the Glee club. The Musical club and the Athletics Association are also clubs that show up in the articles but will be less focused on in this research.
Being led by the term “Fine Arts club”, this club mainly focuses on visual arts. However, it includes other sections of arts, such as music and performance. For visual arts, they had a variety of resources that went beyond drawing, illustration, and painting. It seems the club began using all these materials in an assembly hall that they worked to turn into a studio; “The Green Room ovcMhc Assembly Hall until recently has been a room of many uses and of no explained origin (as yet). Dr. Meier tried it out as a conservatory for a while. Since Dr. Foster did not consider it a healthy place for rat families, it has proved an excellent scenery and costume resting place. That it has been and such a chaotic one.
The awakening came, the Renaissance better, when some visionary in the Fine Arts Club saw the possibilities of it becoming a place to fool around in modeling clay, oil paint, and charcoal in those spare moments—we hear about.” (Gatepost,1932).
After the club was formed and became a mainly visual arts club, they quickly started expanding to other art forms. They soon had an annual performance production, complete with college student actors and instrumentalists. This combined both music and performance, which became large parts of the Fine Arts club as well. An example of a show performed by the Fine Arts club is “’You and I,’ a comedy in three acts by Philip Barry.” (Gatepost, 1932). This would include working together with the Musical club. The club had plenty of members, at one point a total of 65 members had attended an end-of-semester party. It also was very active with sponsoring and raising funds for many activities in the college, such as the “metal craft and radio groups.”
Home economics is a club that focuses on many different topics which all contribute to good home management. The club’s full name is the Louisa A. Nicholass Home Economics club. This club has prepared and sponsored many events in FSU throughout the years, on multiple different occasions. It is a very welcoming club that invites anyone at the college since no prior experiences are needed for meetings and events within the club. Due to this, it had a large number of members. It also appears to be a rather calm and professional club where tea is often made and shared at meetings, an example being on “Saturday, November 17, [where] the Home Economics Club served tea at the Mary Hemenway Alumnae Association meeting at Framingham.” (Gatepost, 1934). Members and staff often share about their own lives and how it connects back to home management, such as Ms. Cummings traveling to Mexico and sharing her experiences with “a very interesting exhibition of pottery, glassware and textiles which she had purchased while in Mexico.” (Gatepost, 1935).
As stated above, the Home Economics club includes a variety of topics. Some include interior design, family finances, helpful skills such as cooking and sewing, and budgeting for household needs. Interior design is often discussed, with several mentions and discussions of household objects such as pots and pans, rugs and wallpaper, and appliances. Not only are uses for these objects discussed, but also their history and value are also often traced back to their time and studied. The club frequently invites and welcomes guest speakers who further expand upon these many topics. They also will join meetings with other home economics clubs from other colleges and universities, and sometimes form the meetings themselves.
Finally, the Glee club is a drama club that is themed around all the aspects of performance. Students in this club will often put on shows that present their skills with acting, singing, playing instruments, set design, etc. They will sometimes team up with the musical club and the university’s choir to put on memorable performances, which they have many meetings for and practice with each other diligently. They annually preformed on Thanksgiving and sung carols around Christmas. They have even sung these carols together on several radio broadcasts, such as WEEI and WBZ. This club was certainly not the only Glee club around at the time, as FSU’s Glee club would collaborate and create joint performances with clubs from other colleges and universities as well. Some include “Worcester Teachers’ College, Worcester Tech, and Clark University.” (Gatepost, 1938). These performances often attract audiences beyond students and staff at FSU, and many people will travel far to see the Glee club’s shows. This includes when “Guests came from as far as Great Barrington and North Adams to Springfield on March 15 to hear the joint concert between Massachusetts State College and Framingham State Teachers College.” (Gatepost, 1939).
Some of these FSU clubs are still continuing to run, some have been heavily changed, and some no longer exist. However, no matter what has changed or happened to them, they all have a great and extensive history. The research done here was all collected from nearly a decade of Gateposts, however the Gatepost did continue going for much longer, and every article contains an even greater amount of the history and many stories of these clubs, and how many students and staff were a part of them. It truly shows how important the clubs of FSU have been such an important part to the university as a whole.