The union opened partially in the winter of 1951, but it was officially dedicated on February 6, 1952.¹ The Mac Weekly published a special issue in honor of the event, writing, “Old Main breathed a sigh of relief today. At last the old building is going to get a chance to grow old gracefully as student activities, that have been crowding the old guy for years, move out and into the new Student Union.” The opening of the Student Union represented a shift in the structure of the college’s social life. In the 1950s, there was no residency requirement for students, meaning that some students chose to live off-campus rather than in the dorms. If you did live on campus, the events and social life on campus were often centered around individual dorms. With the construction of the Student Union, Mac students now had a dedicated place to hang out away from their dorms.