Clifford D. Endicott

The Student Army Training Corps (SATC) brought 200 soldiers to Ripon College.  The women were moved off campus to Hotel LeRoy and the soldiers took over, among other buildings, Bartlett Hall.  When they left three months later, “the cottage” was in shambles, and the women chose to remain in Hotel LeRoy.

Clifford Endicott was one of the soldiers stationed in Bartlett from Sept.- Dec. 1918.   He boarded in Bartlett Hall, Room 300. During this time he wrote faithfully to his hometown sweetheart, Iris.  She collected them in this letter book, given to the Archives by Bruce Elliott, class of 1970.

His letters give us insight into what life was like on campus during the last few months of World War I.  Despite the tumult occurring elsewhere, students at Ripon College in 1918 seemed to share the same concerns and sources of fun as their peacetime counterparts. 

Endicott recounts the frivolities of freshmen/sophomore hazing as well as more serious campus issues, like fear of the Spanish Flu pandemic.