Siegfried Ramblers' spirit of community helps unite the dorm
By TIM LOGAN
Scene Writer
Three years ago, Siegfried was a girl's dorm.
It had 246 female residents, a security guard and pink tiles in the bathrooms.
But when Flanner Hall closed and was converted into faculty offices, the female residents of Siegfried and neighboring Knott Hall were sent to West Quad and the Flannerites moved in.
Siegfried still has the pink tiles of old, but the dorm has spent the last three years forging a new identity and building new traditions, working to create a community inside the walls of this building. And that community has been formed, with hall events gradually growing and the dorm making its presence known on campus to increasing degrees.
Events like the just-completed Scrambler Week, which included a Stonehenge concert, a golf outing and a dance, raised hundreds of dollars for the Conor Murphy Bone Marrow Fund and brought the dorm together.
But it is the spirit of community found in each of the dorm's six sections that truly unites the residents.
"Everyone always has their doors open," said junior Tony Bondi. "It is a welcoming place."
The community that has been built in the dorm over the past three years is evident in the high number of juniors who are staying to live their senior year in the dorm. Next year, 41 members of Siegfried's first male freshman class will be the first group of men to live in the hall for four years.
The building itself is one of the more comfortable on campus. Built in 1988, it has full air conditioning and laundry facilities. Every floor has cable television in the lounges, in which many friendships are formed during "SportsCenter."
Athletics in general are a uniting factor in Siegfried. Residents have made their presence felt on the interhall athletic fields all year. Accomplishments have included a second place regular season finish in football, second place in the playoffs in ice hockey and a championship in interhall bowling. Siegfried's team also won the fall interhall basketball tournament and knocked off Matt Doherty's team of basketball coaches at Midnight Madness in October.
The Ramblers' rivalry with neighboring Knott Hall lives on in the Flanner Cup, a series of athletic competitions and feats of strength for bragging rights between the two dorms.
While Knott may occasionally win the cup, they have never been able to match Siegfried in one area. The Ramblers have campus' only interhall marching band, a gaggle of Notre Dame band members and other musicians who try to inspire the dorm's football team to victory each Sunday of the interhall season. The band was founded during the stretch run of the 1998 season and played at every game this year, helping the Ramblers reach the second round of the playoffs for the first time.
Community is built in other ways in Siegfried, through the well-attended dorm Mass each Sunday, through the traditional run around campus the morning of the first football game and through the many section events each month.
With large freshman and sophomore classes picking up where this year's juniors have left off, a new generation of Ramblers — one that has never been asked "Isn't Siegfried a girls' dorm?" — will take the hall, and its growing sense of tradition and community, into the future.
All Scene Stories for Monday, April 10, 2000
