The Class of 1887 Gate was designed by Hoppin and Ely and built by Norcross Brothers on Waterman Street in 1903. The verse beside the gate was written by Theodore Francis Green 1887.

Welcome, O undergraduate,
Within this ’87 gate!
All entering here find hope endures,
The fount of knowledge still allures,
And here good fellowship abides
To cheer and help whate’er betides.

Line 3 of the verse is a paraphrase of Dante’s Hell, Canto III, Line 9, “All hope abandon, ye who enter here.” It also applies to “Hope” College at the right inside the gate. The “fount” in line 4 is the college pump in back of Hope College, and the home of “good fellowship” is the Brown Union at the left inside the gate.