The Claremont Colleges are bubbling with myths, some mere rumors, others partial fabrications, and a few that are actually true. These stories are fun to talk about, but few have actually been debunked—until now. Below are four "busted" 5C myths: a tragic circumstance, an ironic condition, a friendly prank gone awry, and a potential scandal. Can you guess which ones are true?

Myth # 1 (Scripps): The Ghost of Toll Hall?
Most Scripps students are familiar with the spooky myth circulating Toll Hall—a student died and now haunts the dormitory. No one knows exactly how this rumor started, but superstitious students have transformed this single myth into a myriad of conflicting ghost stories.

The Ghost of Toll Hall is not a single myth, but a jumble of stories with contradicting evidence and conclusions. Some students claim the Toll Ghost haunts the entire dormitory, while other students claim she haunts Toll Browsing Room. Some Scrippsies believe that the young woman committed suicide in Toll Browsing Room, while others claim that she never attended Scripps, but was accepted and died before her freshman year. Another rumor holds that two women committed suicide together. According to Alex Pauley (Scripps, 08'), "I've been told that the blue chair in the browsing room originally belonged to a student at Scripps that killed herself. After she died, her parents donated the chair to Scripps, and the girl haunts the room because it was her favorite chair." Another Toll resident reports, "I don't really believe the story, but I prefer not to study in the browsing room late at night. It has an eerie vibe."

A popular student claim further perpetuates this myth—the mural painted onto Toll Hall, entitled "Fruit of '44," is a monument to the deceased Scripps student. This eerie mural is located in the Rose Garden and depicts the class of 1944 hanging from nooses on a single tree.

So where does the story end and the truth begin? For starters, the furniture in Toll Browsing Room was donated by Mrs. Balch, and not by a deceased student's parents. Furthermore, the Claremont College archives as well as the Pomona and San Bernardino obituary archives do not have any records of a Scripps student suicide.

The Los Angeles Obituary archives has one record of a Scripps student dying—In 1945, freshman Evalyn Thacker Starr fell off of a horse and died from internal injuries. The details of Thacker's death, however, are incompatible with stories revolving around the myth of the Ghost of Toll Hall. Evalyn did not commit suicide and her parents did not donate furniture to Scripps College. Furthermore, the mural "Fruit of '44", painted onto Toll Hall and located in the Rose Garden, cannot be a memorial to Thacker because she died in 1945 and was a member of the class of 1948.

Myth # 2: Pitzer College Built on a Landfill?
Have you ever wondered why Pitzer College, the fifth and newest addition to the Claremont Colleges, contains so many slopes and mounds, while the remaining 4Cs are located on flatter ground? The answer to this question is contained in a popular myth—Pitzer College was built on a former landfill. This is ironic, considering that Pitzer is one of the greenest colleges, recent developer of eco-friendly dorms built form recycled materials that offer environmentally conscious facilities.

Bad news for Pitzer students—the myth is true. According to two government reports, the Claremont City Dump was located on 1100 Mills Ave, Claremont, 91711. While some students argue that Pitzer College is located at 1050 Mills Ave, the addresses 1100 and 1050 are located on the same street, Mills Ave, located in between Platt Blvd and E. 9th St. It is doubtful that the former Claremont Dump was smaller than a block in span, and therefore, it is possible that the entire block was a former landfill.

Many Pitzer students remain unaware of the school's previous function. According to Corey Fredman-Fetzer (Pitzer, 08), "I had never heard about Pitzer being built on a landfill (and I'm not sure how many people have), and never noticed any health problems or anything while being on campus, so I suppose it isn't such a problem for the students. It also seems to kind of fit in with the Pitzer mentality of not letting anything, even waste, go to waste."

In a Los Angeles Times article dated 1970, former president Dr. Atherton recalls walking from the office of the dean of faculty at Claremont Men's College, realizing that Pitzer College was the site of the old village dump "with nothing on it but rocks and sage brush." When Pitzer College underwent its initial construction in the early 1960s, bulldozers clearing mounds for Scott and Sanborn Halls turned up remnants of the Claremont Village's early history, from busted wagon wheels to tin cans to baby buggies.

According to a 1954 Los Angeles Times article written, the city of Claremont decided that year to purchase a new landfill in replacement of Claremont City dump, ten miles west of Claremont and three miles west of Pomona. This 100-acre piece of property was located on Brea Canyon Road, and, according to a 1955 Los Angeles Times article, the Claremont City dump was still in operation at the time of purchase. The article elaborates that the further distance of the new landfill required an ordinance to raise the price of garbage collection from 75 cents to one dollar, active in 1956—the same year that the Claremont City Dump closed down.

Myth # 3 (Harvey-Mudd): Case Dormitory was Moved 6 Inches North, Forever Ruining the Plumbing?
Case Dorm residents spend more time in the bathroom than residents of any other Mudder dorm. These students are not vain or germ phobic (at least for the most part), they just want to maintain hygiene, and weak water pressure in Case Dorm makes this a difficult task. One HMC myth provides reason for Case's faulty plumbing system- student pranksters moved the original stakes to Case Dormitory, weakening the efficiency of the already implanted water pipe system. How credible is this myth? If students actually moved the stakes, the architect and constructions workers must have realized before the building was completed…right?

Mudder's are renowned for carrying out clever, systematic pranks. Famous examples include the Caltech cannon heist of 1986 and the instance when students moved items in the Dean of Student's office 20 meters south of their original location. The telephone and Internet still functioned on their new location—a grassy lawn. Mudder's are so gung-ho about their pranks that the administration established a policy requiring pranksters to leave contact information so that the prank could be reversed within 24 hours if necessary.

While the Case Dorm Myth falls under the Harvey Mudd category of precise and witty pranks, the question is, how could students get away with such a joke?

The personal account [imbed with hyperlink: http://www.ashep.com/sw/hmc/cannon.htmll ] of the Caltech Cannon Heist, also provides answers to the Myth of Case Dorm. The account is given by David Somers, a former student and ASHMC president in 1986, Somer (Harvey-Mudd, 87') relates, "In '86 I was ASHMC president and had a bit of a prank reputation. I was nearly expelled for moving the stakes of New II/ 7th/ Case Dorm early in construction." This information confirms the first part of the myth, that students did partake in a prank to move the stakes of Case dormitory.

A Harvey Mudd alumni blog says that in 1985, students decided to move the stakes to Case Dormitory during early construction, so that it would be "premoved." Dressed in ski masks and armed with calculators and measuring tape, the students moved all four stakes six inches to the north. They did such a crafty job that the construction crew didn't notice until after the foundation had been laid. The California earthquake law forced them to re-inspect the new location. It wasn't an earthquake hazard but it's been a plumbing disaster ever since.

Myth # 4 (Pomona and Scripps): Laxatives In Sodexho Dining Hall Food?
Have you ever experienced a bout of sickness after eating at Scripps or Pomona Colleges? Perhaps a rumbling stomach or a queasy sensation? If you have, there's no need to feel embarrassed, because you are not alone! A popular myth circulating the Claremont Colleges is that Sodexho, the dining service provider at Pomona and Scripps Colleges, laces their food with laxatives. In fact, this isn't a 5C myth, but a nationwide rumor that college students have been harping on for decades. How did this myth begin, and is it credible?

It's not a myth that college dining hall food lacks nutritional value—even healthy options are either absent of flavor or drenched in salt, butter, olive oil, or all of the above. While college students do tend to eat more unhealthy foods in dining halls, is this the only rational behind dining hall food's ability to conquer our stomachs?

Students have varied theories of how and why laxatives are put into dining hall foods. One favorite is that Sodexho puts laxatives in their food to prevent lawsuits against food poisoning—an unlikely story! For starters, it is not a serious crime to get a few students sick, but it is quite illegal to intentionally lace student's foods with laxatives. Sodexho would face severe legal ramifications for such a practice, and as a leading international corporate provider of dining hall services, they do not have incentive to take this blatant risk. Another popular rumor is that some foods are infused with additives that function as laxatives. A final rumor is that Sodexho puts natural laxatives into their foods. Sodexho has no motive for doing so, but it is possible that they incorporate ingredients into their foods that work as natural laxatives.

Sodexho is regulated by the Hazard Analysis Critical Control Point (HAACP) under the FDA, a comprehensive food safety inspection program that monitors and controls the temperatures of foods, trains foodservice workers to conduct proper hygiene, trains employees on how to prevent cross-contamination, conducting safety self-inspections at every unit every 30 days. Furthermore, Sodexho provides the SelfServ Certification program, sponsored by the National Restaurant Association Educational Foundation. This is an eight to sixteen-hour training program on safety and hygiene that employees are required to recertify in every three years. While this is all fantastic news, one question remains—are there government regulations against additives that function as laxative?

The FDA permits the use of sodium phosphates, which can work as laxatives in conventional food processing as buffers, whipping, foaming, and neutralizing agents and dietary supplements. It is also used to enhance meat products so that they last longer and taste better. Sodium phosphate inhibits the growth of spoilage microorganisms, extending the shelf life of meat by 30-50%. The apparent result is cheaper, tastier, and safer food, however, it is an unhealthy additive that makes you have to use the bathroom more often. The USDA permits this ingredient as long as it does not exceed 3% of the product and the Food and Drug Association does not require food labels to cite whether food was genetically modified at any point—Sodexho is legally permitted to use this ingredient, so watch out what you eat.

According to Mollie Ruskin (PO, '08), a member of the Pomona alliance against Sodexho, "Many of Sodexho's products are transported across country, and we want them to begin working more closely with local service providers. We live in California and have some of the best produce in the nation and we are wasting energy by shipping in food from other parts of the country. If Sodexho changed their ways, they would save energy and supply better food to their consumers." Sodexho does not release specific information about their meat products, but if they do in fact ship meat across country, it is likely that sodium phosphate is used to increase the life span of products. This ingredient was present in the Tyson Chicken Breast Strips at Manhattan College in Riverdale New York, and guess which dining service company provided this dish? Sodexho. While Sodexho's website provides nutrition facts on their dishes, they only include basic ingredients, and leave out all additives. All in all, the company does not make vital nutritional information available to consumers, and if you are concerned about the potential laxatives issue, stay away from dairy and meat—go vegan!

The moral to the story is this: Sodexho is allowed to use additives and natural ingredients that function as laxatives, and although they have no accessible information as to whether or not they do use sodium phosphate, they have not openly denied using this ingredient, and it is likely (because most large-scale food providers do use it) that they incorporate this ingredient into foods for the purpose of price, safety, and convenience.