Fires on Campus

Architect Charles Gwathmey’s brilliant solution to the fire-gutted Whig Hall is an emblem of Princeton’s inspired tradition of merging old and new, a feature that makes its campus the most inviting and inventive of all. I am reminded of all those fortuitous fires in the Middle Ages that gave rise to new Gothic cathedrals — and of course the Great Fire of London that cleared the way for Wren’s St Paul’s! Onward.