CALTECH STUDENT HISTORY NOTES
PAGE HOUSE
Adapted from the Caltech websiteWhen the North House complex (see North Houses) was completed in 1960, Page House was primarily populated by former members of Ricketts House. House construction was funded by J.R. Page, former vice president of the First National Bank in Los Angeles, and chairman of the Caltech board of trustees from 1943 to 1954.
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| Page House courtyard |
Members of the house are known as Pageboys (even the women), and the house crest includes the "mechanical horse" with a banner reading spe labor levis, a Latin idiom meaning "May the work be light" (and is often followed by "And the drinks be heavy"). One of the largest houses, Page has been home to KCAL, the Interhouse Roller Coaster. It also used its access to the basement so that Pageboys could cover the concrete with dry ice, a prank copied in the movie Real Genius.
In response to other houses quixotically claiming certain items to be off-limits in regard to pranks (rendering them "Non-RF-able"), the Page House president at the time named that the President be unprankable as well. In the past, there were two items in Page House that could not be the target of pranks: the pool table felt and a poster of President Nixon that is passed on to each house president shortly after s/he is elected.
All student rooms in Page are designed as doubles; however, when vacancies arise, upperclassmen may live in rooms as singles. According to house bylaws, the newly elected Page House president may choose to reside in any room as a single. The FU, across from the Library, is Page House's entertainment room, complete with dozens of bean bags. Its name originates from a Ditch Day stack in which the resident graduating senior and president painted a large "F" on its door. Rather than painting over it, Pageboys simply painted a "U" below it. The FU was formerly a triple, and before that was the RA apartment, which is now located downstairs. The Library itself is important to Page House culture, and although its collection is always being removed to be recycled elsewhere, its contents are meant to reflect the works and contributions of contemporary Pageboys. Owing to its distinguished status, one must wear shoes while in the Library. Recently, as a result of pressure from the Deans, the Library underwent renovation, and was reopened after a few weeks.
Pageboy activities include grilling on The Bridge, champagne at Millikan ("Bubbly") to celebrate the end of quarter, and Intrahouse, in which all eight alleys in Page partake in the annual tradition of applying primer and painting edgy, humorous pictures. The painting in between alleys 6 and 7 covers "the fruit wall", a favorite target for PVC-borne projectiles, particularly fruit which tend to vaporize on contact. In addition to Intrahouse, there is the Wait Staff Initiation, and the Greased Frosh Race, in which Pageboys make liberal use of Caltech's grounds and upkeep fund by selecting a designated freshman in each alley (referred to as that alley's Greased Frosh), who is then sent running on the Beckman lawn in the effort to evade upperclassmen who are trying to tackle an opposing alley's Greased Frosh before theirs is tackled. Pageboys then rinse themselves in Gene Pool, producing a visible Crisco and lard film on the surface. Until 2003, they first rinsed in Millikan Pond, but the location has changed owing to administrative request, and now all the Pageboys rinse off completely in the Fleming showers.
Notable alumni include: Ron Gregg (1969, Ph.D. 1977) – nuclear physicist who founded Outdoor Research; Stanley E. Whitcomb (1973) – Chief Scientist at LIGO when gravitational waves were first detected; Dale Bredesen (1974) – founded Buck Institute for Research on Aging; Hal Finney (1979) – software developer who received first bitcoin transaction; Lance J. Dixon (1982) – Stanford professor at SLAC Theory Group; Sandra Tsing Loh (1983) – performance artist, radio personality, playwright, author; Edward Felten (1985) – Princeton Computer Science professor; Stuart Ray (entered Class of 1986, B.S. Vanderbilt) – Johns Hopkins Professor of Medicine; Stephen Hsu (1986) – Michigan State Professor of Physics, former university administrator; Sabeer Bhatia (1991) – co-founded Hotmail.
A list of most of the Page House presidents and resident associates is attached as Appendix P.
Last updated 4/10/04.
Christopher E. Brennen