"Most of the people who were in those clubs had not been veterans," he remembers.

Veterans, however, registered their own mark on the Harvard social scene. Many social organizations, like the Veterans Theater Company, sprung up to serve the unique needs of the former soldiers.

The Harvard Chapter of the American Veterans Committee (AVC) quickly became the largest club on campus with 830 members at its peak--35 percent of the undergraduate population.

The AVC moved into the second floor of Phillip Brooks House, sharing it with the student council. The AVC ran seminars for veterans on how to use the G.I. Bill and navigate the ways of the College.

It also provided a social outlet for veterans, bringing in outside speakers and running dances.

"The veterans tended to congregate with each other. But there was no sense of isolation," Harriman says. "There wasn't a real gap, a real separation."

Indeed, the veterans were not entirely disconnected from the other undergraduates.

In 1949, a group of veterans joined together and organized the first ever all-college dance, called the Jubilee. A huge success, the dance attracted hundreds and brought together musicians and Radcliffe students.

For their part, the Radcliffe students looked up to the returning soldiers.

"To be honest, we considered them older men and more on the ball," Ellis says. "I met my future husband, and he wasn't as immature as some of the younger guys."

Not all soldiers dated eagerly, although those who did found it easy to find dates because the older soldiers often had cars.

"They were more impatient, less willing to go through the rituals" like Radcliffe's "Jolly-Ups" or Wellesley's get-to-know-you dances, Lionette recalls.

The Family Man

The epitome of the Harvard Man, obviously altered in the post-war years, also had to accommodate for a new breed--the Harvard Family.

And while undergraduates had been married before, never to an extent where they lived in entirely separate communities divided from the rest of the College.

After the war, the University watched as the number of married students on campus swelled from 12 in an average pre-war year to 660--forcing family housing complexes to be created at Fort Devens and at the Hotel Brunswick in downtown Boston.