A list of ingredients—from then and now—that have made Notre Dame the special place it is.
The Golden Dome
Monk Malloy, the president, living in a single room in one of the oldest residence halls on campus
The band marching through campus, playing “The Victory March” late afternoon on a football Friday
Coeducation
A morning run around the lakes in autumn
Knute Rockne
Bookstore Basketball
Tom Dooley
Touchdown Jesus
The Congregation of Holy Cross
Interhall football in full pads
Screw Your Roommate dances
Junior Parents Weekend
The chariot race at An Tostal
Christmas in April
Neckties at dinner
The abolition of Saturday classes
Student shows at the Snite
A midnight walk across a hushed campus in January when big flakes of snow are falling, turning everything serenely white
The stay hall system
Single sex dorms
Parietals
In loco parentis
UNDERC, LOBUND and the Medieval Institute
The Center for Tropical Disease Research and Training
Rad Lab
John Houck’s ethics class
Meeting your favorite teacher at the Pay Caf Oak Room to talk
The Keenan Revue
Freshman mixers
A Long John and Mello Yello at food sales in the basement of Farley
Sister Jean
The Bun Run
The Dog Book
The Milk Riots of 1951
The Beer Riots of 1984
The season’s first big snowball fight
The hall chapels and dorm Masses
SUFR, GLAND, the PSA and ROTC
Notre Dame Encounter retreat weekends
Kegs ‘n’ eggs
Quarter dogs
Notre Dame and Yale cited as the nation’s top two programs for the study of philosophy of religion
Notre Dame 71, UCLA 70, January 19, 1974
Vetville
The bachelor dons
The Prefect of Discipline
Going to class
Getting out of class
Basketball at the Rock
Basketball games at the old Fieldhouse
“Badin Bog Ball”
Burning caloreis while watching TV at Rolfs
SMC chicks
The squirrels
Kellogg, Kroc, Cushwa, Keough and the Institute for Latino Studies
Regis, Phil and Condoleezza
The Folk Choir singing at Mass in Sacred Heart Basilica
The Glee Club caroling in the women’s halls during finals
Marshmallow wars at halftime
Architecture grads “styling” their mortarboards at commencement
The Center for Social Concerns
Eighty percent of all students doing volunteer service
The Collegiate Jazz Festival, Blues Festival and Sophomore Literary Festival
Seventy percent of all undergrads lettering in at least one varsity high school sport, with 38 percent having been team captain
The leprechaun
The shirt
Stonehenge
The sprinklers watering the sidewalks
The 1960 Conference on Pornography and Censorship
Seven Heisman Trophy winners and 11 National Championships
Driving up Notre Dame Avenue when the dome is shining and the trees are orange, red and brilliant gold
A catholic Catholicism
Lights out at 10
6 a.m. sign-in at chapel
Frankie’s, Corby’s, Rosie’s, Nickie’s, Simeri’s, Louie’s, Rocco’s, Sweeney’s, Bridget’s, Coach’s, Boat Club, and the ’Backer
Sneaking in after midnight
Black Mack
The naked swim at freshman P.E.
Tackle football in a foot of snow
Circus lunch
The graffiti dance
Notre Dame 68, Purdue 66, April 1, 2001
Rudy
King Kersten
Ronald Reagan as The Gipper
Martin Sheen as Josiah Bartlet
The abduction and travels of the Sorin statue
Julian Samora
Playing flag football under the lights on the fields by Stepan
Studying on the 10th floor of the library
Study breaks on the second floor
George Craig, Morris Pollard and Laszlo Barabasi
The South Shore to Chicago
250 Notre Dame clubs throughout the world
Tyrone Willingham
CILA, ACE and the Andrews Summer Service Projects
Al Sondej
Monogrammed waffles at the South Dining Hall
The Huddle
Angiers, London, Innsbruck, Rome, Tantur, Australia . . . Notre Dame first among major research universities in the percentage of students studying abroad
The road to Saint Mary’s
Father Griffin and Darby O’Gill
Joe Evans
Frasier Thompson
The Gipper column in Scholastic
The Observer at lunch
Ara, Leahy, Lou and Muffet
Meeting the team buses at the Circle
The ducks
A funeral ceremony for an alligator, complete with chants, hymns and burial behind Sorin Hall (and the subsequent sermonizing in The Religious Bulletin against the sacrilege of mocking Catholic rituals, which should not be made fun of under any circumstances)
The Religious Bulletin
Clashmore Mike
The fencing team
The Bengal Bouts
Wind tunnels, atom smashers and low-energy nuclear physics
Expert advice on the Dead Sea Scrolls
Notre Dame 1, Portland 0, December 3, 1995
John O’Hara, CSC
Moose Krause
The Irish Guard
The Fisher Regatta
Pep rallies in Stepan
Pep rallies in the Old Fieldhouse with its balcony and beams, dirt floors and aging brick walls
Hot Chili Is Groovy
The Naked Kahuna
Terry Buck
Ranking in the top 20 both academically (U.S. News & World Report) and athletically (the NACDA Directors Cup standings)
“Molarity” by Michael Molinelli daily in The Observer
Maid service
Laundry service
Roommates
The Basilica bells tolling the hours
Siegfried freshmen getting their horns
The NBC contract
Alan Page, Chris Zorich and Ruth Riley
Nobel Laureate Eric Wieschaus
Dennis Jacobs, the 2002 U.S. Professor of the Year
Late-night coffee and conversation at Reckers
“You can talk about God here and no one snickers.”—Norman Mailer
Watching Knute Rockne All American in Washington Hall
Ralph McInerny and Dick McBrien, Charles Rice and Michael Baxter, CSC
“One of America’s most wired campuses”
The sitting U.S. president coming to campus to speak
Moratorium Day, 1969
Fifteen minutes to cease and desist
Notre Dame graduates getting accepted into med school at a rate twice the national average
The accounting department always in the top 10
The law school among the top four in teaching quality
Springtime on the south quad, lying on a blanket reading One Hundred Years of Solitude with music and Frisbees flying through the air
The 9/11 outdoor Mass
The look on the face of a freshman moving her stuff into Lyons
The look on the faces of her parents during commencement
The Grotto in springtime, when the western sky is rosy with sunlight at dusk
The Grotto in autumn, when the canopy trees are radiant and leaves are underfoot
The Grotto in winter, when the candles glow and snow blankets the night
The seniors singing Notre Dame, Our Mother at the end of the final home game
Emil T. Hofman
Frank O’Malley
Theodore M. Hesburgh, CSC