Nostalgia for Home
By Michelle Kalinowski ('07)

The elevator operator in Hafey-Marian Hall slept so deeply even the bell wouldn't rouse him. Students who wanted to get to their dorm rooms knew to wake him by giving the door a good kick.

Many of those same students might remember that a sociology professor occasionally snoozed in the bathtub in Father Al Croce's room—that is, when Croce was finished with the services he held there at night. These are just some memories of those who knew Hafey-Marian as their home away from home.

King's purchased the former Marian Apartments in 1954 from Wilkes-Barre . It was a glorious building filled with mosaics, fancy woodwork and fireplaces. Residents were high society folks, including Percy A. Brown, businessman and delegate to the Republican National Convention, who lived on the 6 th floor.

Each floor had big suites of rooms, each complete with one or two bathrooms, a living and family room, a dining room and maybe a work den. Some apartments took up an entire floor.

King's changed the layout to suit educational purposes, and the six story building on the corner of North Franklin and Jackson streets was at least partially converted to dorm rooms. The name changed, too.

“When the Diocese of Scranton took over, they named it in honor of Mary. This changed the spelling and the direction of the meaning. Hafey was named after the Bishop,” says Rev. William Ribando.

At the time, the first floor housed two visitors' lounges, a kitchenette and rooms for three priests. There was a small infirmary where a nurse would work two to three times a week. The other floors housed residences, some rooms smaller, some larger.

“Hafey-Marian was spread out a little more home like,” says Rev. Patrick Sullivan, former dean of students.

The Rules

Once the building served as a dormitory for freshmen, strict rules required students to be in their rooms by 7 p.m. to study .

“Lights out weekday nights for the freshman was midnight. On the weekends they had to be in by one o'clock and lights out by two o'clock. Upperclassmen didn't have to be in until 2 o'clock on the weekends and 12 o'clock on the weekdays,” says Sullivan. Violators of the rules were assigned to Dawn Patrol, a gentle form of punishment Rev. Sullivan brought with him from Notre Dame. “I would take them up to the other side of the bridge or maybe a little up by the Dallas highway and I would say, ‘Get out.' They would say, ‘Why?' and I would say, ‘You're going to walk back,'” says Sullivan. One former Hafey resident is King's president Fr. Thomas O'Hara, who attended from 1967 to 1971. He did not have curfews like those of the late 50's and early 60's, but he knows the rules were strict because his brother had attended then.

“At that time they did have a curfew and so he would sometimes miss the curfew and he would climb in on the side window into his room,” says Fr. O'Hara."

His brother earned the nickname Spider O'Hara, but he didn't follow his brother's lead: Fr. O'Hara says his fourth floor room was too high for the climb.

Family Time

In the winter, some students would use wood planks and hoses to create an ice skating rink just outside. But most residents spent time in the building's basement where they created a game room with a pool table, ping pong tables and pin ball machines.

“Students dug out the dirt left from construction and passed it out the windows and dug out a good part of the basement,” says Sullivan

The basement was also a setting for fear and suspense during the Vietnam War as students watched the draft roll on TV.

“People screamed expletives; people banged the wall and it was just awful. For every number that was pulled out, people were at the edge of their seats. It was a tough night,” says O'Hara, who had been one of those students waiting for his draft number. “Some people left that room elated because they had number 320 and they knew they weren't going to get drafted. I left with 166. So I was right in the middle. I never got drafted.”

Moments like this are what helped students bond—and attend masses Father Croce held in his room at 11 p.m.

“They were amazing spiritual retreats and times of calm and reflection for whomever participated. The cafeteria ladies used to bake real unleavened bread for him to use at these services,” says Louise Wasserott, Director of Alumni Relations and a 1975 King's College graduate.

“We would be jam-packed in those rooms. I used to go there and it was for people, a lot of people like myself who had a lot of questions about what was happening in life. His masses were a time for people. He didn't preach,” recalls O'Hara.

The Past Meets the Future

The building that once felt like home with its long hallways, high ceilings and pipes that would clank when the heat came on, changed again in the 1980s. College officials converted it to classrooms and office space for Humanities and Social Science.

When Fr. O'Hara returned to King's in 1988 to teach political science, he was stunned. “The first office I was assigned to was in Hafey-Marian and it kind of freaked me out because the last time I was in Hafey-Marian I lived there, and now I was in Hafey Marian in an office building,” he says.

But with change comes a bit of longing. “It's more modern and they did a good job of renovating but there's always a little bit of a nostalgia for the old residence of Hafey Marian,” says O'Hara.