I often think about a passage from the book “Sophie’s World” by Jostein Gaarder, where a family is having dinner and the mom goes to the sink and the dad starts floating in the air. The young child, not used to this world’s routines, laughs and claps at the sight, but when the mom turns around, she’s frightened and screams. Why would the mom scream in such a situation? It’s because of habit. People often get used to the way the world is and forget what it could be. Or sometimes what it was.

To start, I wanted to build a pumpkin on Storke Tower big enough to see from afar for next year’s Halloween. Something physical and a spectacle to look up at that reminds students of not only what’s possible, but also a change in a building that has so long been unmoved. I researched the tower and found little information until one thing caught my eye: a small Wikipedia section claiming that UC Santa Barbara students used to rappel down from the top. I was astonished and intrigued, but found there was no source linking the claim, and no photo I could find. Not anywhere: not in old yearbooks, not on the web, not even in the Daily Nexus. So I went out to find proof on my own.  

It took some digging, but a weeks-old Instagram post by UCSB about Storke Tower led me to the right people. I found a few comments written by alumni from the early 1980s to 2000s, some simply reminiscing on visits to the observation level, and others claiming they took part in rappelling down Storke Tower on multiple occasions. I became even more shocked that this event had only recently stopped taking place, and yet there were still no photos of those students. 

However, I remembered the first iPhone came out in 2007 —  just a year after I was born. As time passes, we become used to the current era and time with items we use habitually. iPhones, microwaves (I love microwaves), freezers and everything that we forget never existed before us. But this event happened and now, when I walk out of the University Center and look up at Storke Tower, it’s strange to think that at one time I could’ve seen students rappelling down from there.

These students were a part of the UCSB Reserve Officers’ Training Corps, a program for students preparing to join the military after attending university. I looked through some old UCSB class catalogs, as well as old Reddit comments, and found that they were a part of the Basic Mountaineering class (emphasis on the word basic), which we no longer offer today. I found out that UCSB stopped offering the class after the 2006-07 school year. The only thing left to do was contact the former students in hopes of any of them having a photo. 

I got responses of the expected: “Yes, this happened, but no photos.” Until one email slipped into my inbox from someone named Harvey Holt and it contained the photo I was looking for. It might not be the only photo, but it’s the photo.

Photo courtesy of Harvey Holt

When I received the photo, I couldn’t help but shake. Maybe out of fear from what I was seeing, or the fact that I was seeing it at all. I couldn’t believe an event this exciting and astonishing was not one for the history books. 

This photo was taken in February of 2008, which most likely makes it one of the last expeditions taken before the class was discontinued. It features Holt, the former UCSB student who sent the photo. In our conversation over Instagram, he recalled the moments before his descent: “I remember wanting to back out once on the ledge but the instructor told me to take a deep breath and go for it.” Nerves sometimes get the best of us, but at that moment, Holt’s didn’t. Instead, he took a calm, deep breath and went for it. The instructor’s words left no naive optimism in the air, but instead allowed for clear thought and recollection of all that had come before, from mountain descent training to learning how the gear worked. It all led up to this.

I could walk around campus and tell students and staff that we used to have a class that allowed students to rappel down Storke Tower, but I don’t know if many would believe me. Like the floating dad in that story, I think it would be too impossible to imagine. 

Nowadays, if any students walking with their friends came up with the fun idea to rappel down Storke Tower, they might be called insane. But back then, they wouldn’t have been some daredevil. They would be a student walking out of class, looking up and seeing their friend’s descent. This wouldn’t be some out-of-the-mind idea; it would be those students’ lives, their daily routine, their habits. Now that that way of thinking is lost, thousands of students couldn’t imagine participating in that activity, but one time, they would’ve been allowed to just do it. 

I think about that dad floating in the kitchen and what my reaction would be, what I would do if I saw students rappelling from Storke Tower today. Or if in my next four years here at UCSB, I can convince someone to allow me to put an extremely large pumpkin on top of Storke Tower (it would be iconic). All of these things and concepts break us out of the comfortable position of habit we are in. 

After all those years, Holt hopes that this article could bring back the class and activity for new students to enjoy. To be able to snap a picture of Storke Tower was different back then compared to today. When walking past the plaza, seeing your buddy dangling from the top of the tower would be a moment for the eyes and eyes only. And now, it’s just a thought, like that large pumpkin.

I would like to thank Holt for sending these photos from his incredible descent, other UCSB alumni, and our military service for providing information about the event.

Jeremiah Jack thinks the philosophy behind building a pumpkin on Storke Tower leads to a more open-minded world.

Photo courtesy of Harvey Holt.