"The Club" (known more formally as the "University Boarding Club") was initiated when the college opened in 1899 in downtown Raleigh. This program, the idea of President Blasingame, gave some students a less expensive alternative to the traditional room and board arrangement and was designed as an opportunity for a higher education for less affluent students. That first year, tuition plus room and board in the Main building totaled $165.50 a semester, but this was beyond the means of many who wished to attend college. The young women who boarded in the East Building (formerly the “Adams Building,” an existing structure on the new campus) and in two additional cottages as part of “the Club,” paid a cheaper room fee ($10) and did their own cleaning and cooking, dividing the labor and the cost of food among them; a manager purchased the supplies. (In 1909, President Vann described Club member's work in a letter as "3/4 of an hour of light domestic service a day.") Many, who by necessity took this path, became leaders on campus, serving as Student Government presidents, Y.W.C.A presidents, class presidents, editors of the Twig and as May Queens.
The Club arrangement lasted until 1931, surviving the move to the new campus. (Club students ate in the "basement" below the main dining room.) Ultimately, the classification of students with separate spaces and food arrangements was seen as divisive, inefficient and ultimately unnecessary, as students needing to earn money could do so with jobs on campus. Still, for 32 years, the Club rebutted the idea that a college education was only for rich girls.
College historian Mary Lynch Johnson wrote that when the Club program ended, there had been "widespread regret," especially by the alumnae who had taken advantage of the opportunity to fund their educations. Nellie Page Smith (Class of 1917) felt that students had received training in cooking and serving, learned "habits of punctuality of and thoroughness," and enjoyed "good food, pleasant work and happy fellowship."
The Club was located in East Building on the original downtown campus.
Student Margaret Ferguson (Class of 1904) managed the Club during her time in college
Aerial view of the downtown campus with East Building at the lower right of the downtown campus.
Sarah Cook, as she appeared in her sophomore year in 1926-27. In an undated essay she wrote several years later, she remembered:
After my father's death, in my sophomore year, the funds dwindled. I had to do or die....I worked. Those girls who wanted to help themselves belonged to "The Club" where they helped prepare and serve food. Mrs. Beulah Cooper, the club dietician, posted the duties and hours of each girl. It was a wonderful experience. There was youth and "joie de vivre." I helped make thousands of biscuits. We could have been called the "Kitchen Elves," for we whistled or sang as we worked. Many lifelong friendships were born in the sharing and confidences as the tables were set or syrup pitchers replenished.
Carlyle Campbell Library
Meredith College
3800 Hillsborough St.
Raleigh, NC 27607
919-760-8532
