By Alli Dayton, Managing Editor
Over time, Gettysburg College students have enjoyed traditions such as Twilight Hour, the First-Year Walk, International Food Festival, and Springfest. Now, many of these traditions have changed, and new traditions have taken their place.
Twilight Hour, a tradition that began in Jan. 2013, gathered first-year students in the ballroom to walk to Pennsylvania Hall. Class officers then presented the president of the College with a scrapbook from their first semester and students learned the Alma Mater. This event occurred annually until 2019 when the College discontinued the tradition.
“Twilight Hour was an attempt to create a new tradition for the college and it just never really stuck,” said Director of Student Activities and Greek Life Jon Allen. “We found…students weren’t really getting meaning out of it.”
Another event with changes was the First-Year Walk. In 2021, the class of 2024 participated in this tradition during their sophomore year due to the pandemic, which altered their experience.
“Doing the first-year walk [as a sophomore] made me realize how much we missed out on during our first year,” said Maddy Filetti ’24.
This tradition changed again in 2022 when the walk occurred along a new route following “a review of the use of cemeteries that are located in National Parks across the country,” according to Dean of Student Success Keira Kant.
With this change, the speeches after the walk no longer occurred in the location where Lincoln gave the Gettysburg Address at the Gettysburg National Cemetery.
Jack Young ’26 shared, “While the tradition is nice in theory, the actual implementation leaves much to be desired.”
Further, International Food Festival experienced modifications before becoming a component of Springfest.
Allen explained that the event was originally called Crabfest, “where dining bought a whole bunch of crab legs,” then students advocated to change the name to Oceanfest to provide alternative meal options.
In 2016, “there was an institutional push to think about how do we have more celebrations of internationalism in different cultures around campus…so we transitioned Oceanfest to International Foodfest,” explained Allen.
While International Food Festival originally occurred in the fall, the pandemic necessitated a change, so the event was held in spring 2021. In response to student feedback, International Food Festival permanently moved to the spring as a part of Springfest.
Allen explained that this move created a gap in the Springfest schedule because International Food Festival replaced several hours of programming. This allowed for the addition of 75 student-run activities last year, like Holi, Earth Day Fest, and the Black Student Union field day.
Additionally, beginning in 2020, Springfest no longer included a hired performing artist.
“The rationale behind this was that the types of performers students would want us to bring…would cost more than my annual programming budget,” said Allen. “The last Springfest concert that we did…we had to charge $20 per ticket and only 200 to 250 students showed up.”
Allen also discussed the emergence of new traditions like the Second-Year Halfway Hullabaloo.
Class of 2025 President Carl DeMarco ’25 explained that during this planned event, class officers will ring the Glatfelter bell “to ring in good fortune and success in the class’ remaining two years,” followed by a gathering with refreshments.
Despite attempts to improve traditions, students described a lack of tradition at Gettysburg.
“From what I’ve heard from upperclassmen, we used to have more traditions and stronger connections within the student body,” said Rachelle Dale ’25.
Alyssa Maslowski ’23 detailed her perspective as a senior.
“I feel that the college has taken away or altered many special events that students look forward to throughout the year,” said Maslowski. “I would love to see traditions…make a return, or find a way to incorporate new traditions that bring together the entire campus community.”
This article originally appeared on page 14 of the April 2023 edition of The Gettysburgian’s magazine.
