@MIZZOU ASKS YOU

Food and Fun

Dining at Mizzou has definitely changed over the years. Today, Campus Dining Services includes four all-you-care-to-eat dining options and five take-out locations, three convenience stores (one is open 24 hours a day), two food courts and two coffeehouses.

@Mizzou readers share their most memorable or funny dining experiences …

I lived in Lathrop Hall in 1981-82 and worked in Dobbs cafeteria. Every semester, we would have a special steak and shrimp night. On one of those occasions, something happened to the baked potatoes; they just weren’t appealing to the students. So, they were all dumping them in the food troughs at the end of the meal. Another cafeteria worker and I were given big spoons to get the potatoes moving along (tough job!) So, to make it a little more challenging, we decided to have potato races. Before too long, we had to hand our spoons over, as the student diners and even the cafeteria manager wanted to try their hands at the race! It didn’t become a tradition, as the next steak and shrimp night the potatoes were cooked right!

– Laurie LaBrier, BSN ’84

My most memorable dining hall experience was taking trays from the dining hall (with the help of an employee) and using them to sled down a hill by the veterinary science building after an ice storm. A good ride could take you across the parking lot; a bad one would send you crashing into the cement parking barriers to finish your ride without a tray. Ahh … good times.

– Paul Hess, BS Ed ’94

One of my most memorable dining hall experiences revolved around Rollins Dining Hall, a rowdy group of friends and singing “Happy Birthday.” I think I can speak for most of my friends when I say that dinner had to be the highlight of the day – not for the food, but for the dinnertime antics. A group of 10-15 of us would meet each evening in the Rollins computer lab (yes, we were all geeks!) and then trek upstairs to eat dinner.

Someone in the group declared that it would be great fun to spontaneously pick someone to sing “Happy Birthday” to every now and then. Although there were other victims, I seemed to be their favorite because I was so easily embarrassed. The scene went something like this: Some time during dinner (always to my surprise), someone would stand up and say, “It’s Niki’s birthday today!” Everyone else in our group would then stand up and sing “Happy Birthday” to me at the top of their lungs. They even had everyone else in the dining hall joining in. At the end of their serenade they would all applaud, and my face would turn a deep shade of red. I think I had about five birthdays that year!

– Niki Finley Stanley, BS Ed ’97

In 1950 I was in “temporary housing” and ate at the Mizzou cafeteria. The dietician had apparently been told to use eggs from University Farms. She dressed in black and wore black lisle stockings, if that gives you a personality clue. She was rumored to have slapped one of the cafeteria workers.

Coddled eggs are delicate, cooked in a slow oven in glass dishes with a drop if butter and some water. She used muffin tins with the cheapest grease available and cooked them to a leathery crust. They were inedible and indigestible. The garbage cans were full of them. No amount of remonstration did any good.

One day I was staring down at this brown yellow eye on my tray, and picked it up and hurled it across the cafeteria to break on a wall. Before you could blink, the air was filled with flying “hockey pucks” as they were called. It took two extra hours to clean the cafeteria, and the dietician was fired.

I never told anyone that I was the source of this campus revolt. It seems a clear example of out-of-touch management.

– E Samuel Levy, BS EE ’51

As I lived, not in a dorm, but at the Chi Omega House, I have no dining hall stories. However, I well remember the time we hosted a fraternity (which shall remain nameless), and the guest at my left ate my salad. I was then chapter president, with the housemother on my right, so I couldn’t laugh out loud.

– Gretchen Lovett Lamont, BA, BJ ’57

My freshman year at Mizzou (1983-84) I lived on Stephen’s campus because the Mizzou dorms were full. One day in the cafeteria, as I turned around with my food, a chicken wing flew past my head. I ducked behind a square concrete support column while the biggest food fight I had ever seen transpired. The entire room had food flying in all directions. One piece of food was never properly disposed. Even on the last day of school, on the window ledge that led to the second floor of dining, a mostly eaten chicken wing sat as a reminder of the Animal-House-like antics.

– Steve Midgley, BS BA ’88

I lived in Schurz Hall from 1980-83. The guys on the first floor instigated a food fight that was the worst-kept secret on campus. The employees in the cafeteria knew and were prepared, but it happened anyway. There was food on the ceiling, large windows, floors, chairs and tables. Several people in anticipation had worn rain coats. It was quite a scene.

– Heather Hancock Levin, BS HE ’85

I remember one of those rare times when I was eating alone during one of the summer sessions at MU. All of a sudden during my quick evening meal at Eva J’s, I heard on the radio playing in the background that a tornado had been sited a few miles northwest of campus. The tornado sirens started blaring, and everyone was evacuated into a waiting room in Johnston Hall.

There we sat as one big group for quite sometime, listening to the radio for more word on the tornado. If I recall correctly, there was more than one sighted that evening. Finally, we were released back to our plates of cold food. It was an evening that was hard to forget.

– Christine Buenemann Hord, BS Ed ’97

My most fond memory from the Pershing Group Cafeteria occurred in fall 1966 or 1967. Mizzou football fever was at a high pitch on this Friday evening; the Tigers were playing a road game at Oklahoma the next day. A few of us Marching-Mizzou types decided to get a yell going, “Are we going to beat Oklahoma?” After a couple of cheers, every student and cafeteria worker alike was responding with a very enthusiastic “Hell Yes!”

I believe this school spirit must have helped our guys in Norman, Okla., the next day. I believe we upset the Sooners 10-7 on a last-second field goal by Bill Bates. This was not the only time school spirit and camaraderie were evident in our cafeteria, but it was the most memorable.

– Leo Downey, BS Ed ’93, M Ed ’95

I was a transfer student arriving at Schurz Hall in January 1976. I knew very few people in the dorm, including my roommate. The first few days in the dorm were interesting, and I discovered several people from my hometown also lived there. We ate meals together on a regular basis.

The first few times we went to the dining hall, I noticed that there was a table full of guys that would randomly hold up knives, spoons and forks when girls walked by. This went on for several days, and finally I was curious enough to ask one of my friends what was going on. I was told that the guys were “rating” the females walking past their tables. A spoon was better than a fork, and a knife was better than a spoon. A spoon, knife AND fork … well, you can imagine!

– Sally Hagood Blickhan, BS ’77

During my freshman year at Mizzou (1989-90) I lived in Mark Twain Hall. I will always remember the themed meals that were prepared. My friends and I would get especially excited when there was a sundae bar or when it was Mexican night! We always had a great time getting together at mealtime and joking around the entire time. When I think back to my time at Mizzou, all I can remember is how much fun I had all four years there.

– Jennifer Evertt Cassidy, BS Acc ’93

Some friends of mine would have pizza-eating contests on Pizza Night at the Wolpers dining hall. The staff, however, was only allowed to give out one piece at a time, so it was a revolving door. The kids wouldn’t even sit down at the table! It just struck me as funny because it would have saved the staff a little time if they would have just given them the whole Pizza!

– Kathy Zilly Gilmore, BA ’92

This probably won’t count because it wasn’t in one of the dining halls – it was in my sorority house – but I’ll never forget it! It was a typical stormy spring evening, and we had just sat down for dinner. The food had just been served when the tornado sirens went off. Instead of everyone leaving their plates at the table, we all picked them up with our glasses and carried them with us to the basement level floor. We all sat there huddled on the floor eating dinner, waiting for the all-clear to sound. I still laugh when I think about it!

– Stacia Hentz, BA ’84

During 1966 and 1967, I lived in Stone House at Loeb Group. I had a part-time job in the dining hall. The entry work for any of the new student help was in the dish room. Everyone started at $1.10/hour. The worst job was scraping food off of the plates and trays at the tray-return windows.

The volume (or lack) of any particular menu item coming through the tray return windows was generally a very accurate indication of the current meal’s palatability. During weekends, the dish room was fully staffed with only student help.

On one particular Saturday afternoon, I was assigned to one of the two tray windows. The entree was a meat and cheese submarine. The bologna had been in the freezer since the Kennedy administration and the cheese had probably endured an even worse fate judging by it’s hard, darkened corners.

The sandwiches were quickly returned through the tray window, and many appeared to be untouched. Because the students weren’t eating their meals, they were returning their meal trays at a pace that was even quicker than for a typical Saturday noon meal. The trays were piling up faster than I could clear them. The window was jammed full. I was working as fast as I could, but getting further behind. My counterpart at the tray window on the other side was buried like I was. Having to work on a beautiful Saturday afternoon was punishment enough, but arms covered up to the elbows in mustard, milk, butter pats, soaked hot dog buns and “what’s that?” was too much.

The guy at the other tray window started complaining. I didn’t want to listen to his whining; I had enough problems of my own. I picked up a piece of bologna and flung it at him like a Frisbee. It went over his head and stuck flat to the tile wall above the tray window. He returned fire with a slice of cheese, with a similar result. We traded salvos with each other, and soon all the other dish room workers joined in. It was a food fight that would rival Animal House and the climactic pie fight in the The Great Race.

At first everyone was taking sides. Then it became a free-for-all with meat and cheese flying in all directions. Then, admiring the patchwork design of round pink bologna and yellow cheese squares that adorned all four walls of the dish room, we took aim at any bare spots on the wall. We were probably up to about 300 or so wall decorations when the dining hall manager walked in to see what all the laughter and yelling was about.

Our efforts to redecorate the dish room were not appreciated. In addition to completing our normal dishwashing and dish room clean-up tasks, we had to take a hose and spray the walls to remove the meat and cheese. I am not sure what was in that bologna and cheese, but some of it stuck to the walls like an adhesive, with a suction strength that was too much for the pressure hose. It ultimately had to be scraped off by hand.

Maybe it was a good idea that nobody ate those sandwiches after all.

– Jim Barkley, BS BA ’70

I have two stories I always tell, and after 20-plus years, they still get a laugh.

Being born and raised in a small town, Columbia was really “the big city” for me, although I tell people I spent four of the best years of my life there. When I came to MU in fall 1977, I lived in Johnston Hall (and stayed until graduation). A couple of weeks after school started, a group of us were at the table, and decided to introduce ourselves and where we were from. One gal was from Hannibal, one from University City, one from Affton, and others were from around St. Louis.

I said, “I’m Pat, and I’m from Chillicothe.”

Cindy, who was from a small town near St. Charles, looked at me quizzically and said, “Is that a suburb of Kansas City?”

Many alumni have good memories associated with mealtime at Mizzou. Photo courtesy of MU Publications and Alumni Communication

“Not unless they annexed it and the 90 miles between them since I was home over the weekend,” I shot back.

Cindy and I became nearly inseparable the next two years.

However, I think my favorite story is this one. It started at the dinner table, which is why I am including it here.

For my second semester freshman year and my sophomore year, I roomed with Amy, a “farm girl” from Urban, Mo. In the late ’70s one of the major news topics was farmers protesting prices and other things. This one week, there was a group of farmers driving tractors from all over the country down Pennsylvania Avenue in Washington D.C. At dinner one evening, a group of us were discussing the plight of the farmers. One girl, Jan (not her real name), was at the table. Jan was from St. Louis, I think she graduated first or second in her class, had an IQ in the stratosphere, and was generally an intelligent person. At one point during our discussion, Jan interrupted, saying she had heard enough about the farmers. “Why should I care?” she said.

Now Jan was a heavy milk drinker – she always started her meals with two full glasses of milk on her tray, and normally had one or two more before leaving the cafeteria.

“See your milk glasses there?” I said. “Where does it come from?”

“From the machine,” she said.

“Yeah, but where is it before it gets to the machine?” I said.

“Some manufacturing plant, I guess,” she answered.

Amy and I stared in disbelief. We then proceeded to explain how milk cows eat grass, digest it, produce milk, and the steps to get it to the table. Jan sat, mesmerized by the story. Everyone else at the table was interested, but it was pretty obvious that Jan had absolutely no clue where her milk came from. After Amy and I finished, Jan sat quietly for a couple of minutes. She then stared at the remaining half-glass of milk and said, “I had no idea. I guess I really should care about the farmers, then.”

Soon after that and a few more stories about what “the loon professor did today,” the group broke up and went to our respective rooms. Amy and I rushed to our room and slammed the door so nobody could hear us laugh. We couldn’t believe Jan had no clue about the milk.

About 8 p.m. or so that night, Amy and I were studying, but left our door open. We heard a light rap on the door. Jan was standing there, and introduced us to three of her friends.

“Guys, you gotta tell them that story,” Jan said.

Amy and I looked at each other and asked, “What story?”

“You know” she said excitedly “that one you told tonight.”

We still had no clue what she was talking about, because we’d both shared several tales.

Jan looked at us like we were idiots. “You know, the one about the milk; about where milk comes from!”

Amy and I looked at each other and took a deep breath. We recited the same story we’d told at dinner. Four college students, all of them MENSA candidates, stood with their mouths open in fascination.

“I told you it was interesting, didn't I?” Jan said to her friends when we had finished.
They all thanked us and left.

Although I was closest to the door, Amy ran over, slammed it and turned the TV up LOUD. We couldn’t wait for them to get down the hall before we had our second belly laugh of the night.

Dang city people …

– Patricia Lonardo, BS Ed ’81

I was eating pizza with my girlfriend at the time at Shakespeare’s Pizza. It was a cold and snowy day. Across the street used to be a Wendy’s Restaurant. As our pizza arrived we started eating and noticed a guy outside in the snow in front of Wendy’s who was acting a little odd. First of all it had to be about 10 or 20 degrees outside, and he had no coat. Next thing I saw was the guy taking his shirt off. I said to my girlfriend, “Turn around and take a look at this guy across the street.” As she did he proceeded to strip down to his birthday suit. She screamed, “Oh my God, he’s naked!” With that everyone in the restaurant turned around and saw the exhibition. Shortly thereafter the police arrived and told him to get into the car. He hopped into the driver’s seat and almost took off. The officers grabbed his arm and yanked him out of the car in time. It still gives me a chuckle every time I think of that cold day eating pizza.

– Christopher White, BS Ed ’86

This thirty-year-old story may not be the sort of event you sought, but it was indeed
memorable. One day at lunchtime, I had dropped into the old Mac’s Campus Snack for a bite to eat when a news flash blared through the little greasy spoon, “PRESIDENT KENNEDY HAS BEEN ASSASSINATED IN DALLAS!”

We stopped what we were doing, put our food down, and listened in horror. But the horror was compounded when ‘Mac,’ the owner, stated that he was glad the President had been shot and that he had deserved it. My stomach turned and churned, and I pushed the plate away from me on the counter, wheeled and took off out the door ... never looking back and never to return in all the years since. No tip.

– William Sapp, M Ed ’52

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Last Update: November 15, 2007