Note: Here's a brief history of one of the iconic buildings on the Bluffton University campus.
By Ariel Shuey, Bluffton Icon intern
Built in 1914 on the site of a hog farm and slaughterhouse, Ropp Hall at Bluffton University is now a home to more than 200 female students. The original four story brick building still stands to this day, although many changes have been made.
Ropp was the first dormitory built on Bluffton's campus and has held several purposes over the years, one of them being the main location for meal time as the college's first cafeteria was located in the bottom floor of the building.
Wanda Pannabecker, Bluffton graduate of 1944, was a student worker for the kitchen during her first year at school.
Served traditional family style, each meal was only available when it was served. "Women sat on the left side of the men and the men served the women before he served himself," Pannabecker said. Each table was rectangular shape with a host and hostess on each end. Many people dressed up for meals, especially dinner.
After dinner for a treat, music students were occasionally called up to play piano for the crowd for entertainment.
"I was called up quite a few times," said Pannabecker, who studied voice and piano.
The cafeteria remained in Ropp's basement until 1965 when the University decided to build a new cafeteria, today known as the Marbeck Commons.
On October 1957 the university broke ground for a 66-bed expansion to Ropp Hall. Perry Bush, in his book Dancing with the Kobzar, said Ropp Annex was the "college's first new permanent expansion of dormitory space since completion of Lincoln Hall in 1924."
In 1967 another addition was built. Ropp Addition was added on, making a complete rectangular shaped courtyard in between the buildings.
After each section was built, the oldest section received the nickname "Old Ropp" and has stuck ever since. Old Ropp was then transformed into professor and faculty offices. The English, communications, and social work departments were found on the second floor while the history and religion departments were on the third. Beneath them in the renovated cafeteria were classrooms.
"Having class below my office was very convenient," said Jeff Gundy, English professor at Bluffton. He had his own office on the second floor of Ropp from 1984-2001. "I even remember some of the girls from Ropp coming in to class with their fuzzy slippers on."
The biggest challenge Gundy recalled was band camps in the summer. "They would practice in the Ropp Pitt and would blare, that got kind of loud," Gundy said. He also remembered the pipes banging in the classrooms in the basement.
At 5:20 a.m. on October 24, 1998 the second floor of Ropp Addition caught fire. For everyone else in the building it was just a drill. Carrie Phillips, Bluffton's Archives and Special Collections Librarian, was then a student living in Ropp and she remembers it well. "I got out of my loft bed to leave and there was fire right outside my door on the walls," said Phillips.
The fire sent 14 people to the hospital where 12 were treated for smoke inhalation and two for burns. Later on it was found out that the fire wasn't an accident as everyone was supposed, it was arson as a student, who was a few doors from Phillips, had started the fire.
Today in 2010, Ropp has seen even more changes such as a newly renovated weight room is in the basement along with a conference room and wireless internet access for every student. Ropp also holds the home of the health clinic full time counselor.
Ropp still holds the most students in one dormitory on campus, and as history shows, Ropp is a great place to live.
Ariel Shuey is a student in a Bluffton University feature writing class instructed by Mary Pannabecker Steiner and Fred Steiner.
