Ivy Day

Ivy Day was an annual event at the Women’s College, comparable to Class Day at the College, in which women students had no part except as invited guests. In 1897 Dean Louis F. Snow sent to Cambridge, England for a slip of ivy for the seniors to plant beside the newly built Pembroke Hall. The next year, the planting of the class ivy on June 13, 1898 was referred to as “a time-honored tradition.” The program for the Ivy Day exercises at three o’clock on June 19, 1900 listed six speakers, three senior women, one junior, Dean Snow and Acting President Benjamin F. Clarke, and included the words to “Pembroke Song” by senior Alice M. Tallman. A reception with dancing was held in Pembroke Hall at eight o’clock. In 1902 the ivy chain was introduced, carried by lines of undergraduates in white dresses, followed by the seniors in caps and gowns. A tradition of Ivy Day was the handing down of the trowel with which the ivy was planted to a representative of the junior class for use the next year. The Class of 1918 gave up its Ivy Day exercises in order to use the funds saved for war work. In 1927 the senior reception in the evening became the Ivy Night Dance. In 1928 Ivy Day and Ivy Night festivities were moved to the new Alumnae Hall. Only seniors and juniors and appointed sophomore ushers could attend the dance, at which the traditional Senior Sing took place during intermission. The carrying of the ivy chain ended in 1942. In later years the ivy planting became part of last chapel attended by seniors, on which occasion the seniors wore the class flower and intoned the “Senior Sigh.” The Ivy Night dance continued until the late 1960s to be the last dance of the year at Pembroke College.