Finding the way around our own beat

Many of you have walked the Chapel Walk, but did you know much of that trail is part of another walk called “The Beat”? I first heard about “The Beat” while working at the SJU Archives in early April when I was handed a set of four postcards to organize into a collection. Placing each postcard in order revealed pictures of travels around campus as well as a beautiful poem about “The Beat,” which I later learned came from the March 1891 issue of The Record. Needless to say, my curiosity was officially sparked.

Digging deeper, I uncovered historical articles and photographs detailing this lost campus trail. One of these articles, titled “Autumn Fantasia Lures Johnny Strollers to Odd Corners of Landscape Paradise” from the Oct. 6, 1938 issue of The Record, taught me that this path historically marked the campus boundary that students could not pass without permission. The article also gave me part of a verbal “map” of where the trail used to be. Then, through reading a 1985 Abbey Quarterly interview with Fr. Angelo Zankl, I learned more information about some of the religious shrines and markers that lined the trail, most of which I recognized from the Chapel Walk.

Soon, after combing through old pictures and campus maps, I felt confident that I could trace the original location of “The Beat.” Then, armed with a campus map scribbled with notes, I journeyed on April 18 with CSB junior Elizabeth Wortmann to find the missing trail. We started on the Chapel Walk, spotting remnants of the shrines Fr. Angelo talked about before heading north into the Arboretum. Here we found no physical signs of the trail until we reached an area near the northeast corner of Clemens Stadium. There, exactly where historical accounts said it would be, we discovered a stretch of leveled ground the perfect width of an old trail. If not for the stadium’s many expansions and revisions, the trail would have led south towards a marker known as Excelsior Rock. We then continued hiking around campus as best we could to follow the original trail, even spotting shards of early 20th-century pottery and bottle glass along the way.

Even though this first walk was an immense success, it felt incomplete until Sept. 12, when I finally tracked down Excelsior Rock thanks to a helpful email from Archives Associate Liz Knuth. Excelsior Rock was hauled into place by the Excelsior Literary Society in 1908, and at one time, it held a 35-foot flagpole that waved on the hill above Clemens Stadium. Today, it still sits quietly upon the hill behind Alcuin Library.

While we may never walk the original Beat, we can still explore the campus that we love, enjoying the time and, more importantly, friends we share. As the leaves begin to change color and fall, we can still take a nice stroll with our friends ‘round our own beat.