Elizabeth Susan Weatherhead, class of 1942
Elizabeth Susan Weatherhead grew up in Barrington, Rhode Island, and had two brothers, two half-brothers, and a foster brother. At Pembroke College, she was involved with the Sock and Buskin theater club. After graduation, she worked in an office concerned with war work. Also in her career, Weatherhead was a member of John Chaffee’s staff when he was the governor of Rhode Island, and worked in the real estate business. In 1969, she came back to Brown to work in the library.
Elizabeth Susan Weatherhead begins her interview with a brief family background, noting that her father attended a boy’s school in Barbados while her mother attended a girl’s school in Canada. She explains that having grown up in Barrington, Rhode Island, she was familiar with Pembroke College and was given the same opportunities as her five brothers.
Weatherhead remembers being a city girl – a female day student who attended Pembroke but did not live on campus, and Scut Week – a freshmen initiation week where they had to wear men’s hats, charcoal moustaches, and miss matched socks, while saluting any senior who walked by. She shares memories of professors Magel Wilder and George Downing, and dean Margaret Shove Morriss. She also recalls attending compulsory physical education classes and chapel, and briefly mentions Ivy Day and the effect of World War II on the campus. Weatherhead concludes the interview by summarizing her job history after graduation.