Davis House

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Davis House is a student housing cooperative in Berkeley, California. It is part of the USCA coop system. 36 residents are housed here.

[edit] History

The building was originally built in the early part of the 20th Century as a single-family mansion, supposedly to house the son of one of the Hearst family's attorneys while he attended school at the University of California.^{[citation needed]} The house was designed by architect Julia Morgan, who also designed two other current USCA houses, Wolf House and Andres Castro Arms. It is located at 2833 Bancroft Steps, which is a pedestrian pathway between International House and California Memorial Stadium.

With the completion of Memorial Stadium in 1923 and the International House in 1929, the neighborhood transferred from one of quiet, expensive mansions into a student-oriented neighborhood dominated by sorority and fraternity houses. At some point during this time, the house became a sorority (Alpha Xi Delta) and several additions were made to the building, including a sleeping porch with a deck above that features an expansive view of San Francisco Bay and the Golden Gate Bridge.

With the 1960s, the popularity of the Greek system in Berkeley saw a steady decline. Many sorority and fraternity houses were forced to close for want of members, including this one.

In 1969 the University Students' Cooperative Association purchased the building from the sorority for use as a co-op, one of several former Greek houses it acquired during this era. The price was $75,000 (1969 dollars) and another $40,000 or so was spent on interior modifications, including changing the sleeping porch into private rooms. The house opened to residents in January 1970.

Davis House was established for juniors, seniors and graduate students, and was unique for its time in that members prepared all their own meals, including dinners, rather than obtaining them from the USCA's Central Kitchen on Northside. Like all co-ops, each member had a five-hour workshift every week, and for seven of the members, cooking dinner was the shift. They were free to select what would be served. Breakfasts and lunches were prepared individually by the residents, and at holidays such as Thanksgiving sumptuous meals would be created for which all the students wore their finest.

Davis House was co-ed, and every effort was made to have an equal number of men and women, or as close to it as possible. Three marriages resulted from the first 34 charter members.

Currently, 36 co-opers live in Davis House and one recycler lives in the garage. Davidians compete on an IM soccer team known as Pink Robot House and are consistently found doing all sorts of creative things, from throwing random dance parties in the kitchen while brewing beer, to making music with didjeridoos, accordions, classical piano and their wild rock 'n' roll band.