933 S. State Street

933 South State Street in Ann Arbor was the center of my college experience. This is the story of that house and my time there.
 
The house was built around 1910. For the first few decades of its existence, it looked right over the entrance to Ferry Field. Sitting on the front porch it would have been possible to hear the crowd cheer as Jesse Owens broke 4 world records in the span of 45 minutes in 1935.

This picture would have been from the driveway

1940 Census shows the house was occupied by the famed artist Carleton Angell who created many sculptures on campus and around Ann Arbor, including the famous Pumas flanking the entrance to the Ruthven Museum. He lived in the house with his wife Gladys and their three children.

A parade during WWI turning in front of the house

1950 Census lists Reuben Hartman, a bricklayer tender and his wife Gertrude, a waitress, as the occupants, along with 8 lodgers.
 
Sometime in the decades that followed the house began being rented exclusively to students. One time some guys from the class of 1982 came by and said they had lived there.
 
In 2001 a group of friends who lived there began the infamous BOX house along with some friends in nearby houses. The BOX house was founded on the principals of friendship and novelty. Very soon after the house earned a reputation on campus, which lead to ESPN the magazine including a write-up of the BOX house's famous keg rolling across State St. during football tailgates. The house was then passed down to new generations of BOX house inhabitants along with the traditions, stories and lore.

By the time I encountered the house it had been student-proofed. The original hardwood floors were replaced by white tile on the first floor and berber carpet upstairs. The kitchen had been renovated with builder-grade finishes. What originally was likely a single bathroom on the second floor was split in two and several vanities (pee sinks) added to bedrooms. The siding was white vinyl and the doors were hollow. Any trace of craftmanship was eliminated. The house itself was a dump, but the things that occurred there were the stuff of legend.

My first encounter with the house was at a party during my Freshmen orientation when I got so drunk on the front porch on a warm June night that I slept on a bathroom floor and missed signing up for classes the next day. When I came back to Ann Arbor in the fall I knew exactly where I would tailgate. While my dorm roommate spent his freshmen year football Saturdays as a servant to fraternity brothers that he was desperate to impress, I was immediately accepted in a wide friend circle, no doubt thanks to my older sister who was friends with everyone there.
 

Freshmen Orientation

During my sophomore year I lived in a house 2 blocks away from the BOX house. We would always tailgate at the BOX house, and during that fall the guys living in the house told me I should put together a group to rent the house since they were planning to graduate in the spring. So a few of my roommates and I put together a bit of a ragtag group to rent the house for my Junior year.
 

Tailgates are better with live music

In August 2007 I moved into 933 S. State Street and became part of the next generation to carry on the BOX house tradition. I lived in the back room on the third floor, and upgraded the futon I had my sophomore year for an actual bed. We had 6 guys and 2 girls in the house. Halfway through the year we picked up two more roommates when Brick and Andy were thrown out of their frat and moved into tents in the unfinished basement.

6 of 8 of the 2007 crew before Brick and Andy moved in

The following year was my senior year and the two girls and two of the guys moved out. The two basement dwellers moved into rooms and Paul, Matt and Zola moved in. Zola did a "pledge semester" in the basement, and then moved into a room for winter semester. Matt dropped out of college in the fall and for most of the year we had 9 guys and one hamster inhabiting the house. It was a raucous environment where people would just show up to hang out at any given time. The tailgates that fall were some of the most fun days of my life.

The house oozed patriotism

Living at the BOX House carried with it a certain cachet on campus. Most of the student body was aware of the house and our tailgates. I’d say that more than once I told a girl that I live in the BOX House and she suddenly found me more interesting and/or disgusting. It seemed like everyone had a story about the house.

We may have made this one up

If they hadn’t been there personally they may read about the house as we were mentioned on MGoBlog, College Humor, and a write-up in the Michigan Daily. After I moved out in the summer of 2009 the City Attorney for Ann Arbor sent us a Cease and Desist letter to the house to try and stop the tailgating that they said had gotten out of hand. This lead to some bemoaning in the media and student led protests of the city’s attempts to limit tailgating.
 
While my time in the house had ended, several of the underclassmen roommates continued to live at 933 and then next door at 1001. The BOX house carried on until eventually there was no one left to carry on the tradition and the house reverted back to a regular student house. With that, the BOX house was no more, but the physical house remained.

The house in 2018

When would think about the things I would do if I won the lottery, I always liked to daydream about buying the BOX house and turning it into the most incredible student house. I’d open up the first floor to a big open space with couches and TVs, I’d build bigger porch and 2^nd story deck above, install a great sound system and generally nicer finishes. I’d then rent it out way below market value on the condition that they always host a great tailgate that me and my friends could join in at. That was my dream, but it will never happen.

The house is now fenced off and slated for demolition along with the houses to the north up to Packard. The city has approved a 14-story high-rise between State and Packard and these houses are all being demolished. The front porch where I spent so many hours will be gone, the living room where I watched countless hours of Gettysburg will be no more, the bedroom where I studied and had other significant life experiences will also disappear. In its place only the memories will remain until they too will be forgotten.

The house prior to demolition

 
But I’ll cherish the memories, and wanted to write down some of my favorites since that will leave this on a happier note:
 
Favorite Tailgate Traditions:
Du Hast
We would always start a tailgate Saturday by setting the house sound system (my childhood Gateway computer with WinAmp connected to speakers) to play Du Hast at 5:30 in the morning to wake up the residents, any overnight female guests and half the neighborhood.

Tailgate

Thunderstruck
I think this has gained in popularity in the past 15 years, but the BOX house was well known for circling up when Thunderstruck came on to take turns drinking at each mention of the word “Thunder”.
 
Keg Laps
Typically the Keg was on the porch, so a common game was to drink directly from the key and then run across State St., then across Hoover Ave., and then back across State St before running up the steps and kicking the keg. Miraculously I never saw anyone get hit by a car, but there were some very close calls.

Ann Arbor's finest multi-level tailgate

The Field Goal
Another fun tradition was going out in the street during a tailgate and trying to kick a field over the metal arm holding up the traffic lights. I usually was the holder, and then a few students would be on the other side of the light to return the kick. If it went over the metal arm the whole street would cheer the successful kick. An important thing to note is that we did this in traffic, usually before the cops would come and start directing traffic around 10am.
 
Keg Rolling
Only the most skilled could logroll their keg across State Street, turn it around and roll it back without falling off. I could never do it, but damn if I didn’t try. By the end of tailgate season we would have 20ish empty kegs in the basement so there were plenty of opportunities.
 

Keg Rolling

Favorite non-tailgate traditions:
Fall Foliage Month
During the fall, I think usually in September someone would declare that it was Fall Foliage Month and then we would go out and collect leaves and branches and in one case an entire tree and drag them into the living room. It really spruced up the place for a few weeks.

Fruit in the Street
This was one of the best activities in the house. We would take all the rotten, uneaten fruit from the kitchen/fridge and put it in the middle of State Street. Then we’d sit on the porch and wait for cars to hit it. It was truly joyful game. Eventually the game branched out and the definition of fruit expanded to any food or destroyable items. When the question of “wanna play fruit in the street?” was raised, I never recall anyone ever saying no.
 
Gettysburg
The movie Gettysburg played on constant repeat in the house on a TV dedicated to playing Gettysburg.

Your intrepid author

Hey Ya!
Anytime the song Hey Ya! came on during a party or tailgate everyone in the house would run out to the street for an impromptu street dance party.

Drunkest Man in America
At any given time, someone holds the title of Drunkest Man in America, there was a good chance that man resided in the BOX house, so after a trip to Goodwill there was always someone in possession or challenging for the title of Drunkest Man in America. When the trophy would inevitably get destroyed, we would take another trip to Goodwill.

A typical representation of earning the DMIA title

The Masters/Old Crow Challenge
During the Masters the house would hold an annual beer can golf tournament and try to drink as much Old Crow as possible. There was probably more to it than that, but I was pretty drunk for the whole thing on account of the Old Crow.
 
Friendsgiving
Each fall before departing Ann Arbor to return to our families for Thanksgiving we would host a Thanksgiving dinner for all our friends. We would dress up, and people actually worked hard to prepare a legitimate Thanksgiving feast. It might have been the most “real-life” think we did. But it was always fun and probably the classiest think that we would do.

Christmas Party
The BOX House Christmas Party was always a great way to end the Fall Semester. Besides tailgates, it was probably the most packed the house would get. When Zola lived in the basement he reported that the floor joists would bend and creek with the weight of 100 people on the first floor.
 

All dressed up

Christmas Party

Etcetera
So many little memories. Playing drinking games, Paul’s feud with the street sweeper, watching girls come down the stairs on a Sunday morning looking very confused, Paul’s eating challenges, the house hamster, drinking challenges, and playing through. Many of those small memories are documented by the BOX House blog at https://boxhouse933.blogspot.com/

I'll miss this shithole deeply