When I was a freshman at the U of Alabama, I went to visit my boyfriend at a small college, Florence State, and stayed in the dorm room of some of his female friends (platonic!!) who went home for the weekend. We went out for a bite to eat and were headed to a movie when he asked, "You did check out, didn't you?" Well no, I never heard of having to check out of the dorm! We had to race back to the dorm and I had to pull a card and check out...and then check back in at curfew. Talk about dark ages!
Very few rooms in our sorority houses had individual phones...if the girls were rich enough, they could have one put in (expensive! Probably $25 a month...equivalent of about $150 2007 dollars). Most everybody took calls in the "Anchor Room," a 2nd floor room at the top of the stairs that had 2 phones and three couches. That was command central! Lonely? You could go hang out in the Anchor Room and talk to the pledge on phone duty. Need advice on an outfit? Go to the Anchor Room where there were bound to be a few sisters hanging out, ready and willing to voice their opinions in front of the full length mirror in the hallway just outside. There was usually a card game going on...and of course a few sisters taking a cigarette break...one year during exams, somebody left a stack of tacky romance comics there, which we devoured...those WERE the days, LOL!
