If you haven't been back to Whitman or Walla Walla in 35 years, be prepared for a surprise.
My husband, Bill, and I recently retired and moved to the area. I had not been back to Walla Walla since attending Whitman College from 1960-1964. We were searching for a place to retire in Washington, Oregon, or Idaho. I suggested we stop and look at Walla Walla. I remembered it as a nice, small town with beautiful old homes and lots of shade trees surrounded by rolling hills and wheat fields. Bill had never been to Walla Walla, but he was willing to stop and look it over, especially when he read that it has such an exceptionally long growing season.
What changes 30+ years have wrought! I had trouble recognizing the Whitman campus with all the new buildings let alone the town of Walla Walla. Prentice Hall, Anderson Hall, Mem, and the Library were about all the remaining buildings from my youth. The student union building used to be at the end of the tennis courts across from Lakum Dumkum, I attended biology classes in Billings Hall which has since been torn down. Lyman Hall where I used to hash lunches, had doubled in size. The old gym and infirmary on the Issacs Street side of the campus has also been torn down and replaced. The students looked different too; we were only allowed to wear slacks when the temperature was below zero and if we went downtown, we couldn't wear jeans past Thrifty Drug Store (which is now the Paula Ray Gallery).
When we arrived, Bill asked me to show him around town. I was lost! I found the Whitman Campus and downtown. The only buildings that I recognized downtown were the Bon, the Baker Boyer Bank, and the Marcus Whitman Hotel. I remember Sunday night dinners downtown at the Red Apple Restaurant, but I wasn't even sure that was in the same place. During my college years, I had student taught at Sharpstein and Edison schools, gone to Kooskookie for parties, watched our football team get beaten at Borlekse stadium, and celebrated my 21st birthday at the Green Lantern, but I couldn't find any of these places in the "new" Walla Walla.
I felt like Rip Van Winkle coming back to town after 30+ years! What was the most interesting fact to me as I became reacquainted with the town as a "resident," rather than as a student, was that the town had a "life" of its own and was functioning quite well. When I was here as a student, I thought Whitman was the center and main business of Walla Walla. So much for the egocentricity and naivete of youth.