Peering back through 40 years of Davis history, similarities and differences

In 1909, what was known as The University Farm School opened its doors to 18 eager students. More than 100 years later, the campus now known as UC Davis boasts more than 35,000 students. Although the campus has shifted and grown over the years, UC Davis alumni remember their time as students being not so different from what students experience today.

“Well, I mean, there’s the whole youth and phones and how electronics have come in, but […] students are students,” said Sean Davis, who graduated in 1978 with a Bachelor of Arts in psychology. “For example […]  they procrastinate just as much as they always have.”

Davis has been working at UC Davis for about 20 years now as a lecturer in computer science. Even though he’s an expert in computers now, Davis didn’t have the luxury of laptops and conveniently located computer labs around campus when he attended school here in the 1970s.

“From the standpoint of computers, the basement of Hutchison was where the [only] computer was,” Davis said. “You went down there and you gave them your computer cards and you ran them through the computer and you’d pick them up the next morning with your output. It was just a big old computer which was raised up on special floorings.”

The computer labs in places like the library and Wellman Hall didn’t exist either, but instead were lounges for the students. Wellman itself was a completely fresh design at the time and offered a funky, colorful atmosphere.

“Wellman in the ‘70s was an amazing design,” Davis said. “The interior was all one big […] trip. You’d go in and there’d be a band of blue on a wall coming down at an angle […] and the tiles were blue. Then they had a picture of an electro-micrograph of a head of an ant on one of the walls.”

When Davis was a freshman, he got to experience a whole different kind of Tercero as well. At the time, there were two clusters of six buildings titled the letters of the alphabet, and Davis decided he wanted to join the 64-person Pierce Co-op that occupied the G building.

“They cooked for themselves down where Trudy’s of Tercero was [which] was called Trudy’s Fox Hole [during that time],” Davis said. “The co-op was more responsible, you-do-the-work-for-yourselves-type stuff; we cooked and cleaned for ourselves. That was a terrific experience.”

Another student who happened to live in the Tercero Co-op at the same time as Davis is David Dodd, who graduated in 1979 with a Bachelor of Arts in German. Dodd recalls some of his favorite pastimes as a student — activities a little less popular with today’s student population.  

“We did stuff like going to the barns and jumping from the loft into the hay, believe it or not,” Dodd said. “We climbed the water tower. There was this place called ‘the Trestle’ […] over the railroad tracks, and we would climb on the ladder and walk across. You could go across and go down through a trap door and watch the trains go by. It was quite a thrill.”

One piece of campus culture that has remained through the years is none other than The California Aggie itself, a student-run organization then and now and something Dodd is proud to have been a part of.

“[The Aggie] was the most fun,” Dodd said. “We were a daily [paper], so there was a lot of pressure. I don’t know how many hours I spent writing, but I was just a reporter then to staff writer in my freshman year. The next year I was campus editor, and that was really fun because I got to write anything I assigned myself.”

Dodd enjoyed writing book reviews, album reviews and record releases, but was most stoked for concert reviews. According to Dodd, UC Davis experienced a booming entertainment scene, hosting breakout music groups at the time like The Talking Heads and The Police.

“This was 1977, which was a historic year for rock and roll,” Dodd said. “The big wave happened, all these bands broke that year. And we had this guy booking the Coffee House at the time, and he booked all these acts before they broke and they were at Davis as they were breaking. They would play in stadiums, and they would play in the UC Davis coffee house.”

Room-sized computers, dorm-coop hybrids, a daily print newspaper and CoHo rock concerts are all aspects of Davis culture that have clearly changed through time, but something that stands out the most is the growth in the connection between campus and community.

“When I settled on Davis and moved in, at first I wasn’t sure because it’s such a small town and it seemed like there wasn’t a lot to do or there wasn’t much to it,” said Thara Randawa, a 2009 graduate with a degree in biology. “My wife and I stopped in [Davis] within a few years after we graduated, and the town seemed very different. Downtown seemed […] more active, like [UC Davis] had crept out into the city a little bit; more of that campus vibe had pushed its way out, which is cool.”  

Randawa and his wife went to Davis together a little less than a decade ago, and grew to enjoy their educational experience in a small college town — the most intrinsic characteristic of Davis that will hopefully never change.

“We both really miss it,” Randawa said. “We love where we live now, but there’s something about the town. We both loved it a lot. California is a great place to travel, so anywhere we can work it in [our travels], we like to stop in Davis at the very least.”

A lot has changed over the years, each decade characterized by its own unique contributions. Despite any changes to the campus or the culture, UC Davis students have always retained an affection and pride for their Aggie home.

“A certain tradition at Davis [is] about being serious about school and at the same time being aware of the world, and to know that not everybody thinks the same way,” Dodd said. “You can’t really stereotype a Davis student the way you might a Berkeley student or a USC student, […] and I think that’s part of the big strength of Davis. Anywhere you go out in the world you’re going to meet people who went to Davis. These people will show up throughout your whole life and you will have that instant connection of that [shared] place, and that’s what’s really cool.”

Written by: Marlys Jeane — features@theaggie.org

Staff plans ahead, prepares infrastructure for storms

In Davis, November usually brings the first significant rains of the season. Residents will have to adjust by digging out their raincoats and umbrellas, by crowding the Unitrans buses and by buying bike fenders to avoid the “freshman stripe.” But when rain turns into intense storms, everyone on campus relies on infrastructure to prevent damage and disruption to their campus routines.

While much of this infrastructure might be invisible to students, there are dedicated teams of staff who work hard to plan ahead in anticipation of this year’s storms. When the forecast calls for heavy rains, many of these staff members will meet to coordinate the best course of action.

“Normally, when we know the storm is coming, we have a big meeting involving all the different folks,” said Michael Fan, the director of UC Davis Utilities. “There’s the facilities people that deal with flooding inside buildings and utilities […] and we also meet with the campus Emergency Operations Center. We all sit in the same room to plan, so we know that if something happens, if a really big one comes, we are ready.”

Fan knows the importance of planning ahead, and he and the other groups of staff who prepare for storms are well-equipped to allocate resources effectively.

“I think the key is before the storm, in the planning stages […] I’ve been here on campus for 20 years, so I know where the vulnerabilities and the flooding situations are,” Fan said.  “Campus is designed for certain stormwater levels.”

The utilities unit works with several other campus groups and systems. For example, the Arboretum waterway serves an important purpose during storms, functioning as the ultimate destination for runoff water from around campus.

“When the storms come, we’ll keep the water level lower at the Arboretum waterway, because all the runoff is coming to the waterway,” Fan said. “If that level is too high, the water is gonna back up to whatever the drainage system is.”

Because of its importance during storms, the Arboretum itself needs to be prepared for the rainy season, both in terms of the current construction and routine maintenance.

“All the work inside the channel is completed for this phase, so the rains won’t impact us,” said Andrew Fulks, the assistant director of the Arboretum. “[The waterway] is designed and managed to handle any of the storms we get here […] We prune dead limbs off of trees, make sure storm drains are clear of leaves and pick them up as they come down, cover bare dirt with mulch to prevent erosion. For the waterway, we install absorbent ‘socks’ at each storm drain, to catch any oils that run off the road after the first rains.”

Utilities also coordinates with Grounds and Landscape Services. The grounds crew is often some of the first people on campus in the morning, and they are often some of the first people to respond to damage from a storm.

“In terms of big storms, the first thing we do is come in and check the campus to make sure that it’s safe,” said Cary Avery, the associate director of Grounds and Landscape Services. “We make sure that there’s nothing blocking streets or sidewalks or anything, make sure no limbs have fallen down, we make sure the drains are all clear, and then we basically go through the campus and make sure all walks, roads and building entries are safe and clear.”
Last winter, UC Davis experienced some particularly intense wind and sustained rainfall. The La Rue bike underpass flooded and several trees fell.

“Well, last year was certainly challenging,” Avery said. “What happens is the more rain we get, some of the evergreen trees, they tend to hold a lot of water, and those trees are more susceptible to breaking out with heavy rain. Those are some of the things I’m talking about where we know that we have issues, and we kind of keep an eye on that stuff.”

Despite the challenges presented by storms like those last winter, Fan says that the campus was still prepared.

“Last year the amount of rainfall was huge […] but actually last year, there was actually the least amount of flooding damage,” Fan said. “Part of it is that we’re really used to these planning efforts, to get all the people from different expertises sitting in the same room, to prepare us ahead of time […] the amount of rain actually increased, but I was surprised to see that the amount of flooding was way less.”

For Fan, it’s important for people to know that UC Davis is well prepared for storms, and that groups like the utilities unit are there to help.

“I’d highly encourage people to call us, anytime they see anything stormwater related,” Fan said. “Over the years I’ve been here, I’ve gotten calls from students about dropping skateboards into the water intake, or their lunch or their iPhone […] we have good systems here.”

Written by: Gabriel Mulcaire — features@theaggie.org