HuffPo’s new college vertical just printed a great, sad article about the history of suicide at Cornell, “suicide capital of the combined Ivy League, Big Ten, Little Three, and Seven Sisters.” A staggering amount of research seems to have been involved — and to our mind, the saddest story is that of Shirley Slavin, in 1940:

Shirley Slavin arrived with her mother to enroll for freshman classes. After a few days on campus, she journeyed to the east side of Fall Creek, lingering for nearly an hour. In front of more than twenty witnesses, Slavin asked a passerby to hold her books and purse — and then leapt 125 feet to her death.

The article also delves into the history of suicide prevention at Cornell — including the shocking/wistfully sad rejection of “suicide bars”‘ construction on the gorges.

In 1977, such barriers had been added to the suspension bridge over Fall Creek, which one professor described as a “claustrophobic channel with a honky-tonk garishness worthy of Las Vegas [where] serried ranks of close-spaced bars make a prison corridor.”

The post is part of author Rob Fishman’s Masters’ thesis at Columbia School of Journalism — go read it, please!

No need for Red Bull, or Adderall, ever again, studiers! Harvard Professor David Edwards has developed a breathable coffee, sold for $3 for an individual “stick” that is as heavily caffeinated as a shot of espresso. According to his website, Dr. Edwards doesn’t solely limit himself to researching ways to make caffeine consumption even more gross:

David Edwards’ work includes new approaches to treating infectious diseases, as pioneered by the pharmaceutical company Pulmatrix, and the nonprofit MEND; it includes new ways of eating, such as Le Whif.

So, good for him for keeping busy! The New York Post reports that Dylan’s Candy Bar sold out of the “kooky coffee” within hours, although whether “Le Whif” is a short-term phenomenon or something with staying power is anyone’s guess, mainly because, gross, right?

Hey, remember those T-shirts making fun of Sept. 11 by comparing the Twin Towers to Leverett’s towers? Well, the Harvard Voice, which published an image of the t-shirt, at right, indicates they originated at the Harvard Lampoon. Which has, we guess, gone from making hit movies and spawning comedy legends to, um, silk-screening t-shirts.

Congratulations, Lampoon! You got the campus talking about you again! All it took was a tasteless prank that was foiled really quickly!

Everyone’s favorite Freddy Got Fingered star made a special appearance at Penn this past week for his comedy tour and ended up partying with Penn students. On his website, the actor — and famous ex-husband of Drew Barrymore — posted a video of himself tapping a keg in some unidentified coven of Penn students, all of whom look either ecstatic or bemused.

Where has Green’s career gone? The man used to make big[-ish] movies — now he’s partying at the most oppressively horrible party scene in the Ivy League [well, except for all the others]. With eighteen-year-olds. In the video, he looks quite old… but happy. Maybe the Ivy League is more fun than we think it is — or maybe he’s just collecting material.

Oh, Harvard and your “wit”! At Harvard’s Housing Day — where freshmen are assigned their houses for the rest of their undergrad careers — Leverett House was associated with t-shirts joking about September 11. As an email from Leverett’s faculty advisers, exclusively received by IvyGate, calls the shirts:

fake Leverett T-shirts [...] making a connection between our towers and 9/11.

The Harvard Housing Day website reads:

Each house has its own limited-edition Housing Day t-shirt (or sometimes better… get them polos, Dunster!)

The Housing Day t-shirts for Leverett — or fakes distributed by a rival house, it seems Leverett is claiming? — drew a comparison between Leverett’s Towers (one of which is pictured) and the, um, Twin Towers. Wow, topped even Yale’s “pussy” t-shirts this time, Harvard! Is this the legacy of the Lampoon — humorless, arch referencing of national tragedy? Parody is funny, but this is just boring and predictable. Say the administrators:

But we are also proud of the Leverett House Committees and students who have, year after year, produced shirts that have been clever but not tasteless, and funny without poking fun AT anyone.

There’s that Harvard spirit! The full email from Leverett administrators, after the jump.

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• Brown: Snoop Dogg, MGMT to perform at Spring Weekend — jealous! Although we hear MGMT’s new album is dreadful :-(
• Columbia: Fifteen years of renovations, and Butler Library is still something out of a Bosch painting this time of year.
• Cornell: “Cornell Law School: Ever Heard of It?”
• Penn: Tom Green could win an Oscar and a Nobel, and his obituary would begin with that “My bum” song.

While we mentioned this in yesterday’s RagTime, we had to say a little bit more on the Princeton students who really want you to know about how very hard they’re working for jobs in banking — and their altruistic reasons for doing so. Says future finance intern Sean Pi, whom the Princetonian writer introduces taking a $300 cab ride from JFK to Princeton:

It’s extremely stressful… It does become a very precarious balancing act, trying to go to all your classes and making sure you get to all the interviews. And being prepared for the interviews, too — that’s a big thing.

Yes, carrying a multitude of responsibilities is stressful! We appreciate Pi’s difficulties — and his race into his French classroom from the airport cab [seriously, $300, though? He could have used, like, NJ Transit or whatever...] Especially given that he is trying to convey a totally disparate reality than the one that exists in his job interviews:

‘[Money] is a very, very big reason’ for entering investment banking and consulting, Pi said. ‘But in interviews, [students] will try very hard to convey that they’re not in it for the money.’

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Dear Readers: While one of us is on spring break and the other preparing for his midterms, we will be in slightly slowed animation. Our contributors have good things planned for the remainder of the week, and we’ll pick back up our regular pace next Monday.

xo,

Dan and Alex

Lena Chen, the Marianne of IvyGate’s early days, is back — or, really, she never went away. While she may have cut short the youthful antics that made Sex and the Ivy such a fun read, she’s been trucking away on a thesis — apparently about virginity — for which she’ll take requests. If you send Lena your favorite word, she’ll do her very best to squeeze it into the culmination of her academic career: so far, she’s found places for “hodge-podge,” “willy-nilly,” “lollygag,” and “hullaballoo,” though, shockingly, “sexual napalm” has been elided.

Also, we admire Lena’s ability to build on her past infamy and become an interesting — dare we say delightful? — internet presence. How many internet memes are willing to build on their fame in order to show the world their actual achievements, rather than reveling in bad behavior or disappearing altogether? Bravo, Lena! (But if you make any poor decisions, we’re coming for you.)

• Brown: Mayoral candidate banned from campus after “tossing pro-life video” — only in Providence, I guess?
• Columbia: Or maybe not only there: New York state politics — it just keeps getting better!
• Dartmouth: Senior starts his political career really early, hoping to become either Chris Young or Charles Rangel, depending.
• Harvard: Extra! Extra! Rich people, or students, or something, should spend more money, because that’s “honest”!
• Princeton: “This is the first in a three-part series on careers in investment banking and consulting.”