Princeton, 1962: As “Take Ivy” As It Gets

As a follow-up to our last post, a circa 1950 video on Princeton’s crew team, here’s another vintage gem from the Princeton Campus Life YouTube channel: a 25-minute, professionally shot and scripted orientation film from 1962, dead center of the Ivy heyday.

It’s all here: “Princeton” haircuts, stretched-out Shetland sweaters, white socks and no-break trousers, natural-shouldered jackets, collar rolls and ties askew, bow-tied professors, pipe-smoking in the classroom, touch football on the lawn, bicycling across campus, and khakis as far as the eye can see, all from the school most credited with setting the styles of the Ivy League Look.

Pictured above is the Colonial Eating Club from the same year. — CC

35 Comments on "Princeton, 1962: As “Take Ivy” As It Gets"

  1. the Princeton crew footage is still up – they had to repost it with the audio removed due to copywrite issues.

    http://www.youtube.com/user/princetoncampuslife#p/u/1/sWOVC9mNgVc

  2. The guys actually cared about their education back then. Nowadays the partying is the top priority

  3. Before we start expecting a video of the actual 1965 Take Ivy shoot, I am pretty sure — from the paucity of information we have on it — the Take Ivy VHS was shots of Ivy League students on campus in the late 1970s/early 1980s. This was not exactly boom time for “classic Ivy” looks.

  4. OldSchool | July 22, 2010 at 9:15 pm |

    For those readers who, like me, might not have been able to view the embedded video, but just found a blank white space instead , here’s the direct YouTube link to the film:

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dz_htg5_phs&feature=related

    Oh, the days when a freshman wore a jacket and tie when he went to his advisor’s office!

  5. Thanks Christian, as a Princeton Man, I truly enjoyed this bit

    Always Bumby

  6. Jon O'Keefe | November 6, 2010 at 5:13 pm |

    Love wearing vintage Weejuns with crushed down backs so they slip off ,still put pennies in them,love buying and trading old ones.I wear a sz.13E and have 6 pairs,love them with white socks and jeans,they are so sexy,my # is 302-226-5505

  7. “It’s been the experience of this university…”

    “I think the university is right.”

  8. As a rower, I can’t help but point out that “crew team” is redundant, since a crew is a group of people who work on a boat. Once should say either “Princeton’s crew” or “Princeton’s rowing team.” It’s a common mistake, but for some reason it drives me nuts. The oft-heard “I row crew” is even worse, which means something like, “I row team.”

  9. There is a guy in the front row, just left of centre, who is wearing what look like blue denim jeans to me.

  10. “There is a guy in the front row, just left of centre, who is wearing what look like blue denim jeans to me”

    I am Cornell’ 62. On my campus blue jeans were not uncommon.

  11. All that cigarette smoking! I like how they call a smoke break “taking a breather.”

  12. The young men we see in this picture– they comprise a generation of “leaders” who, with a few exceptions (Bill Bradley, perhaps?), led us (in)to the predicament in which we now find ourselves. The baton of privilege was passed to them and they received it (ah, noblesse oblige), but how did they go about leading and serving? They, like their parents, were surely clever enough to know about industries that pollute, foods that make us sluggish and fat, and an economic system (“supply side”/”trickle down”) that amounts to what an honest Patrician referred to as “voodoo”– it hinders upward mobility and preserves privileges for people who can control (what amounts to) math. But quarterly profits must be precisely that: profitable. And so it goes…

    Sartorial habits aside, things improved with the passing of time:

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hVisLMmNkOQ

    It’s funny–that neckties, oxfords and gray flannel suits were rejected because of affiliations with the Establishment. The Establishment wears whatever-the-hell it (they) want, and today the Establishment prefers hoodies, t-shirts, tight jeans, and sneakers.

    Take a look at Joseph Ellis’ The Founders And Us. Great book — about (in part) how many of the men and women who held positions of authority in industry and government throughout the 70s and 80s betrayed longstanding habits of mind (and spirit) that served our republic well. Will we recover?

  13. All the stripes on the neckties run the American way.

  14. S.E.

    I’m not entirely sure of what predicament to which you are referring. I think this country is doing quite well in spite of the efforts of the evil influences of socialists and communists here and around the world. We are the most free, most benevolent, most generous country in the world. Find a better one and let me know.

    Regarding foods that make us sluggish and fat, try a little will power. It seems to me that many men and women in this country are turning into children who are do not want to take responsibility for themselves. They are certainly dressing that way. Sheesh.

    Cheers,

    Will

  15. My father was class of ’61. I wish he was still alive so I could show him these videos and ask if he recalled any of these fellows. On the fashion front, my father told me once about how small his wardrobe was around this time. A blazer or two, maybe a suit, some slacks, and that’s about it. Does anyone know if the average Princeton man was in fact a clothes horse?

  16. @sacksuit

    Since this could easily become an argument that would go nowhere, I’ll try this: are you concerned (at all) about global warming or income disparity? If not, then that’s that. So be it. But since you’re not the only American citizen with an opinion…

    There are others who think America is pretty damned great but could be even better–even, if I may use the word, ‘greater’ than it has (we have) been. I’m not a professional historian, which is why I referenced an eloquently phrased, well researched book by a reputable historian who’s attempting to engage the Founders in dialogue with modern-day citizens. A noble enterprise.

    I’ll venture a guess that the American version of capitalism has treated you well. So then–why not buy a copy and give it a go?

  17. I was a freshman there in the fall of 1962. There was a divide between the clothes worn by prep-schoolers (I was one) and public high schoolers. All of us wore jackets and ties quite often, but not always, but always to any kind of serious event. At other times, khakis (but the colors varied between the two), OCBD, sweaters, and, yes, weejuns or their equivalent. Like everything else in clothing, it came down to the subtleties. Prep school clothing was what everyone thinks it was, and usually pretty ratty after a couple of months into the school year. High school clothes were almost the same, but not quite. Prep schoolers wore their prep letter sweaters inside out, high schoolers had melton cloth letter jackets with leather sleeves.

  18. S.E.

    I will respond to your points seriatim. Global warming-Farce. Research the University of East Anglia and the IPPC. Income disparity-I don’t, and I’m pretty sure you don’t deserve to make Bill Gates, or dare I say, Trump money any more than a high school drop out loser deserves to make, presumably, our six figure incomes.

    I had to look up Joseph Ellis but I tend to take with a grain of salt anything written by somebody who lied about combat service in Vietnam and participation in civil rights protests in the ’60’s. Not to mention his intermittent professorship at Mt. Holyoke.

    Navy sack suit today with a white OCBD and navy blue tie with silver bars. Cordovan belt and shoes.

    Cheers,

    Will

  19. Second sentence of first paragraph–incoherent. Don’t even bother to try again.

    Assuming you mean ‘IPCC’ (not ‘IPPC’). Yeah–their prognostications are positively rosy:

    https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2018/oct/08/global-warming-must-not-exceed-15c-warns-landmark-un-report

    If you’re seriously still talking about the hacked email (climategate) thing–then are you seriously still talking about that? Talk about a manufactured controversy (a.k.a. “fake news”). Research the number of sources that declare it precisely that. Much ado.

    You’re right about the controversies that have stained Ellis’ career. But he was and remains a fine historian.

    Take a break from the same ol’ , same ol’ (guessing a carousel of Hayek, Friedman, National Review, and Arthur Laffer) and try some new stuff.

  20. Sometimes – most times these days – I don’t blame CC one tiny bit for ditching this whole mess and heading South to meditate.

  21. ^ Paul, I agree. S.E. could politicize a post about a shoehorn.

  22. Read some Engels and Marx in my twenties but was too smart to buy into it.

    Sorry about all the typos. Most of the time I’m typing quickly in my car.

    Have a nice evening, comrades.

    Will

  23. @Sartresky: it takes two (or more) to tango.

  24. Speaking of shoehorns, I think it was Aristotle who, by way of his masterpiece ‘Politics,’ posited that…

  25. Paul,

    I agree that the arguments which ensue at times in the comments are pointless. They detract from the enjoyment of what otherwise is a mostly uncontroversial commentary about a particular style of men’s clothing and lifestyle.

    Cheers, BC

  26. Old School Tie | October 11, 2019 at 9:44 am |

    @Sacksuit – HOW DARE YOU!

  27. In my defense: I wasn’t looking for an argument. I assumed sacksuit would change his mind and agree with everything I wrote.

  28. I cannot say that my mind has been changed by S.E.’s arguments, but since this is national coming out day, I would like to announce something that has been gnawing at me for years. I suppose most of my friends and acquaintances have suspected for years. My wife has even hinted at it from time to time. I’m fit, a bit of a neat freak in a charming way, tall and handsome-think Bruce Hulse’s younger brother. I am usually the best dressed guy in the room even when I’m dressed down. So I would like to get this off my chest and finally declare that I am, in fact, a male lesbian.

    Will

  29. @Sacksuit

    Actually, if you read Marx & Engels and didn’t fall for it, it means you WEREN’T SMART ENOUGH:

    “Socialism in general has a record of failure so blatant that only an intellectual could ignore or evade it.” — Thomas Sowell

    @Paul

    Indeed, some of us are ready to retreat to a interior position. Except that by “retreat” I mean an active, willed forward motion, and by interior I mean that which will keep you steadfast in times of chaos, or, ask Kipling put it, able to keep you head about you while all around are losing theirs and blaming it on you.

  30. Ha! Nicely done, sacksuit.

    Now that this post (comment session) is no longer on the front page, you may not see this reply. I suspect we agree about a great deal more than our back-and-forth suggests.

    Some of us lean conservative on most issues but wish conservative intellectuals would offer better (more creative) responses to a handful of challenges we’re facing.

    My contempt for socialism remains as robust as anyone’s.

  31. Henry Contestwinner | October 24, 2019 at 2:30 pm |

    I enjoyed Will Sacksuit and S.E.’s conversation. It was (mostly) free of the inanity that passes for “debate” these days.

    S.E., if you read the Climategate e-mail messages, then you know that they were suppressing research that disagreed with their AGW claims. That’s pretty serious. In a rational world, Climategate would have derailed the whole AGW/”climate change” imbroglio. That it did not is a testament to how little thought and analysis goes into the issues of the day.

    Having said that, S.E. is right that our leaders betrayed us and our shared patrimony.

    Will Sacksuit, while you are right about people shirking their responsibilities, the obesity epidemic cannot be due to sloth alone. Part of it is due to the misguided dietary guidelines promulgated by the government on the basis of bad science and cherry-picked data pushed by the dishonest “scientist” Ancel Keys. Another part of it is due to the change in what goes into our food. Since “fat is bad” (it’s not) but fat makes food taste good, low-fat food has to go somewhere else for flavor: sugar. Unfortunately, it’s not just sugar, but high fructose corn syrup, whose ubiquity can be blamed on both sugar price supports and subsidies for corn farmers. Food scientists also know what makes food taste good, such as yeast and products derived from it, which is why certain snacks are like crack: once you start, you just can’t stop.

    Yes, morbid obesity is still mostly due to poor choices, but the extra 10 or 20 or 50 pounds that some people carry is mostly due to unhealthy food—with the caveat that a lot of that unhealthy food is touted as being good for you!

  32. Henry Contestwinner | October 24, 2019 at 2:33 pm |

    P.S.: Note that the obesity and diabetes epidemics started after the government started to promulgate its “healthy” eating guidelines.

  33. Henry

    I just inhaled a 10.75 oz. bag of Hostess Frosted Mini Donuts. I’m convinced they are made with a hint of crack. I did run three miles this morning at zero dark thirty and, in my fifties, have the metabolism of a seven year old Swedish boy.

    Cheers,

    Will

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