UA alumni remember yesteryear

Leigh-Anne Brown Arizona Daily Wildcat UA alumna Jackie Schwager signs the list of other 1956 graduates who were present for this weekend's Homecoming events. Schwager was a member of the Delta Gamma sorority during her college days, and remembers working on the Homecoming floats.

How times change.

Schwager, now 64, was a member of UA's 1956 graduating class.

"I came from California because it (the UA) was a smaller school," Schwager said. "You could walk around and know people."

Schwager, who was on the UA Mall Saturday for Homecoming activities, said the biggest difference between the university in the 1950s and today is its size.

"In 1952, the university went over 5,000 students, and that was a big deal," Schwager said. "I think the size would bother me. I am sure it is not as personal now."

Enrollment at the UA now hovers at about 35,000.

Even the buildings were smaller, she said. In the 1950s, the UA men's basketball team played its games in Bear Down Gymnasium.

Schwager, who lives in Tucson, received her bachelor's degree in business. Most of her core classes were taught in Old Main because the Economics building had not yet been built, she said.

The outlying areas of the city had not been built either.

"If you went out as far as Country Club (Road) and you were out in the boondocks," Schwager said.

There were no houses alongside North Campbell Avenue past East River Road, making it a prime spot for college kids.

"The end of Campbell is where everyone went to party," Schwager said.

Even the Arizona Daily Wildcat was different in Schwager's day.

"It (the Wildcat) used to have Kitten of the Month - a good-looking lady, a very attractive student," she said.

Although she did not recall any major political events that marked the early 1950s, Schwager, who was a Delta Gamma, said the era did have a particular feel.

"The partying '50s," she said. "It was pretty good times."

Schwager's husband, Herb, attended the university in 1947. He said students at the UA did their part to keep that feeling alive.

"It was a party school," Herb Schwager said. "This university had a reputation of being the playground of the West."

Fun or not, Jackie Schwager said the rules were much stricter when she attended the UA.

"Back in those days there was a curfew - we had to be in at 10 p.m. on weekdays," she said. "A house mother stood at the door."

In addition to the stricter housing rules, Schwager said women couldn't wear shorts on the Mall.

Homecoming was a big deal back in the 1950s, as it is now, but much smaller and more glamorous, Schwager said. She explained a float she built with her Delta Gamma sorority sisters - a large clock.

"The float, we worked hours on it because the whole thing had to be covered with crepe-paper flowers - it had to be." she said. "You didn't have as many people coming because you didn't have as many alumni."

Anthony C. Braza can be reached via e-mail at Anthony.C.Braza@wildcat.arizona.edu.