The American College Town

Chapter 5: All Things Right and Relevant

5 all฀฀ things฀฀ right฀฀ and฀฀ relevant The lands along America’s interstate highways are normally the most placeless of spaces, anonymous corridors that look the same from Florida to Washington state. Chain restaurants. Motels. Truck stops. Driving along Interstate 80 in California’s Central Valley en route to the college town of Davis, however, I encountered a series of billboards unlike anything I had seen previously in my interstate travels. There were four billboards placed at equal distances like the old Burma Shave signs. The first showed a toad climbing over the billboard and asked: “Why did the toad cross the road?” Subsequent signs answered the question: “To live in Davis because it’s green, safe, and nuclear free.” Early for a meeting on the University of California, Davis, campus, I noticed a traffic circle, but this one was different from the ones I curse all over New England because it was built for bicycles. It seemed like a preposterous idea because most bicyclists I know pay attention to traffic laws only when necessary for their own safety. I watched with amazement, however, as every single bicyclist went around the circle, exactly as they were supposed to do. Rush hour in Davis is when endless streams of bicyclists travel to the university campus each morning—not just students but staff and aging professors. As I prepared for a research trip to Davis, two people offered me the use of a bicycle during my stay. A farmers market is not normally considered a political place, but everything about the Davis Farmers Market exudes the left-of-center character of a college town. One of the first producer-only farmers markets in California , it was organized in 1975 to support area farmers experimenting with organic growing methods and provide residents a place to buy food not produced by agribusiness.1 The farmers market has evolved into a community meeting place that embodies the Davis way of life. Many farmers post signs saying their produce is “certified organic.” Exotic fruits and vegetables are common. One end of the market is set aside for groups promoting every imaginable cause. I met two lesbians distributing fliers on a documentary film about the Boy Scouts’ ban on homosexuals. Another group was promoting an upcoming election initiative, while others gathered signatures for petitions. All over Davis I encountered symbols that demonstrate this town stands apart in the comparatively conservative Central Valley and suggest how different college towns are politically from other places. On the UC Davis campus, hundreds of cardboard tombstones had been erected by critics of Israel’s treatment of Palestinians. The marquee at the Varsity Theater announced a film about Mexico’s Zapatista rebels presented by the Davis Working Group on Globalization. In the window of a downtown newsstand were magazines like Mother Jones and Slow Food. At city hall, a choice parking space was reserved for electric vehicles and a sign in a garden announced that the city stopped using chemical pesticides in 1995. Another sign beside the entrance prohibited smoking within twenty feet of the doorway . Davis was one of the first cities in the United States to ban smoking in all public places, even outdoors.2 Davis (fig. 5.1) is typical of a certain kind of college town where liberal politics are mainstream, moderate Democrats are considered conservative, and Republicans are lonely. College towns are unusual politically because faculty and students tend to be more liberal than the rest of the population .3 This is most true in college towns that are home to flagship state universities and elite private colleges because they attract faculty and students who are cosmopolitan and intellectually ambitious, and they have strong programs in the social sciences and humanities. In that sense, Davis is an anomaly, because UC Davis began as an agricultural school. But it was also a pioneer in organic farming and developed one of the first ecology programs in the country. Moreover, enrollments in the liberal arts surpassed those in agriculture after UC Davis was made a general campus of the University of California in 1959. The town was transformed as the university evolved. Over the years, Davis has declared itself a nuclear-free zone, the nation’s first pro-choice city, and a sanctuary for Sandinista refugees. The Davis City Council officially opposed the Vietnam and Iraq wars. It was one of the first U.S. cities to implement curbside recycling. The city has sought to encourage alternative forms of transportation, building...