Word: toweritis
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...forced to withdraw from the College. These extraordinary proceedings show clearly how bigotry has been as much a problem in Cambridge as in other parts of the country. The weeds of prejudice have grown not only in distant cotton fields but also up the sides of our own ivory tower...
Let’s just think about the costs. If the University decided to give the bells back, it would have to dismantle the Lowell House tower, which was built around the bells, spending millions of dollars and disrupting student life for at least a semester. Significant parts of the residential house would have to be closed—which would invariably make already space-starved Lowell residents even more cramped. All this to give back bells a Harvard alum rightfully bought and saved from destruction. No monastery bells, no matter how symbolic they may be, are worth that much...
Even so, one of the monastery fathers, Alexei Polukarko, defended the effort to topple the Lowell tower, saying, “To transport the bells will be difficult, but if people can fly to Mars then it’s possible.” We hate to point this out, but people cannot, as of yet, fly to Mars. And if people could fly to Mars, it would be extremely expensive to do so. Similarly, we cannot, as of yet, get those bells out of their tower without tearing it apart. And if we could, it would be extremely expensive...
Removing the bells would require dismantling the Lowell tower, which was originally planned as a clock tower modelled after Independence Hall in Philadelphia but was slightly redesigned and actually built around the bells...
Seventeen of the original 18 bells currently occupy the Lowell tower. The smallest measures the span of a hand, while the largest, named “Mother Earth,” weighs a full 13 tons...