of the residence halls by sponsoring regular language tables and classical concerts. Individual counseling was extended, faculty participation was invited, intramural athletic programs were formulated, and academic competition was encouraged and recognized. Hopes for the future could not have been more promising.
Instead, and before the end of the first semester of 1941-42, the United States was at war. As staff and student members of the houses began to enlist or plan to enlist and as the national danger became more pronounced, thoughts of studies and permanent residential organizations diminished and in some cases disappeared altogether. The prospect of vacant residence halls in the face of the national emergency led to only one solution. By the spring of 1943, both the East and the West Quadrangles were involved in the war effort. At the end of that academic year the East Quadrangle was occupied by Army Specialized Groups, and the West Quadrangle had been taken over completely by the Navy. To all intents and purposes the Michigan House Plan might well have been abandoned at that time. But again it proved its vitality as an organization. A nucleus of farsighted staff members in the West Quadrangle approached Dean Bursley and Francis C. Shiel, at that time Business Manager and Acting Director of Residence Halls, in regard to a plan of continuity for the Men's Residence Halls. Of singular merit was their concern for the postwar burden which might come suddenly. Mr. Shiel and Dean Bursley, with the help of Professor Brandt, enlisted the aid of the Board of Governors of Residence Halls. As a result of their combined efforts, some twenty-two fraternities were leased to the University for the use of staff and students. On and off during the war period, seven of these houses were occupied by the men. The remaining staff and students were distributed among the houses so as to do the most good. In time, with additional help from newcomers, a reliable core of staff and residents awaited the end of the war. Among the newcomers some war veterans were to be found. In addition to Bursley, Shiel, and Brandt, no story of the Michigan House Plan would be complete without mention of the contribution of Mrs. Laura D. Niles, Mrs. Elliott K. Herdman, Mrs. Theron Langford, Mrs. Virginia Harryman, Mrs. Woolsey W. Hunt, John Bingley, and Woodrow Ohlsen. The addition of Leonard A. Schaadt, now Business Manager of Residence Halls, and Lionel H. Laing, now a member of the Board of Governors of Residence Halls, indicates the caliber as well as the permanence of the people who were appointed to administer the system during its lean years. The valiant activities of Mrs. Charles W. Lobdell in those years of acceleration will long be remembered by those who otherwise might never have had leave or vacation time.
This scattered effort constituted the Michigan House Plan until enlistment, officer training, and other war needs began to slack off. By 1946 all of the residence houses were reoccupied but not on the grand terms of 1940-41, admittedly the one normal year in the history of the House Plan. In spite of the addition of four houses to the East Quadrangle in 1947, the return of the veterans together with the growing freshman classes, resulted in doubling up in all available space. These crowded conditions, which continued until the completion of the seven new houses of the South Quadrangle in 1951-52, placed a strain upon the development of the House Plan, but did not stop its growth.
The most notable changes took place in the area of student activities. One
