Word: potters
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Dates: during 1960-1969
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...Stephen Potter's career first received public notice for what was to be his most far-reaching exploit. In November, 1960, a three-column story appeared in the CRIMSON that began: "The University's most modern Houses are draining exorbitant sums of money from the University's pockets, but nobody seems to know what to do about it." This news was attributed to "anonymous students," but in fact its source was a letter Stephen Potter had written to the CRIMSON the week before. In the letter he explained that students living in Leverett Towers never bothered to turn...
...CRIMSON threw in Quincy House and jacked the wasted electric bill--Potter and friends never knew how--to $65,000 a year, concluding the story by noting that "the ultimate solution will be putting smaller light bulbs in the sockets...
...Grounds replaced all the 150-watt bulbs with 75-watt lights, which is the way they have stayed ever since. (President Pusey, speaking at Leverett soon after the change, reportedly told his audience, "You can ask me about anything--except the lighting situation.") "We never intended anything like it," Potter's creators say now. They think that the loss of bright lighting on the curtained windows "spoiled the look of the Towers...
Fame brings embarrassing problems to someone in Potter's position, and one of the trickiest was a letter he wrote that was published in Sports Illustrated, the Boston Herald, the Globe, and the New York Herald-Tribune. Potter had discovered that Roger Maris had indeed broken Babe Ruth's record of 60 homeruns in 154 games, since he had hit none at all in the first nine games of the 163-game season, and 61 in the last 154 games, a season no longer than Ruth's. A Maris fan wrote to Potter and invited him to dinner in appreciation...
...letters got results. In the spring of '61 there were rumors that Weld Hall, the one-time freshman residence of both Potter's friends and John Kennedy, might be remodeled. Potter sent a third carbon plea, carefully typed to look like a form letter with a "Save Weld Committee" letterhead, to President Kennedy. The letter explained that Weld should be preserved in its original state as an historic monument because "a President of the United States slept there." Unlike almost every piece of mail the White House receives, the letter never received any acknowledgement...