'Cliffies Keep Hitching Despite Crime Waves

Radcliffe women -- who reportedly fear success -- are still going places, despite the recent slaying of female hitchhikers in Eastern Massachusetts.

The recent murders of nine young Boston women, several of whom were last seen hitchhiking, has aroused concern among most Radcliffe women contacted by The Crimson yesterday. However, most of those commenting said they will continue hitchhiking or walking alone at night if other methods of travel are not available.

"When you're going places, you have to keep going," one Radcliffe junior said yesterday.

The reactions of Radcliffe women have varied from those who now compulsively lock doors and use peepholes after the six-o'clock news to those who militantly adhere to their traditional hitchhiking patterns.

One freshwoman, who hitchhiked from Maine to Vermont over intersession, said that the crime wave frightened her but did not affect her travel plans. "If I had been jumped, I could have handled myself, i.e. with the old kick," she said.

Others have reduced their hitchhiking jaunts to a minimum. Many of those contacted said that they no longer hitchhike alone, but that they still feel safe hitching elsewhere.

The most safety-conscious Radcliffe women have waved good-bye altogether to thumbing in the Boston area. However, some of them said that they still feel safe hitching elsewhere.

"It's crazy to hitchhike here now," one freshwoman said. "But I always did it last year and I did it last summer all over Europe. Hitchhiking is really cool, other people helping each other and all that."

Another freshwoman said that she hitched regularly last semester from Harvard to Radcliffe but that the crime wave has now put her back on her feet. "I don't care how late I am to my classes now -- it's better late than never," she said.

The wave of murders has not prompted the University to increase protection of Radcliffe women. "You've caught us with our you-know-whats down," Stephen S.J. Hall, vice president for Administration, said yesterday.

Hall said that the Administration has assumed that publicity of the crime wave will alert Radcliffe women to the dangers of hitchhiking and going out alone at night.

"But Radcliffe women are naturally security-conscious in all areas because they're gals. For example, there have been fewer thefts at Radcliffe than at Harvard this year," Hall added.

Harvard cannot take responsibility for protecting hitchhikers, "because once they go off campus it's out of our hands," Robert Tonis, chief of University Police, said yesterday.

Some House Masters have recently urged women to take extra safety precautions. Martin Peretz, Master of South House, put up signs in the dorms cautioning residents to keep corridor doors locked at all times. At a North House meeting last Fall, women were also warned against hitchhiking and travelling alone at night.

Radcliffe women have not requested additional safety precautions from the University and one junior said yesterday that special policies for women would "rob us of our dignity."

"Any precautions taken by the University would be paternalistic at best," she said. She added that women should learn self-defense if they feel threatened by the crime wave.

But few Radcliffe women contacted in the survey had considered self-defense lessons as a necessary safety precaution. Mary G. Paget, coordinator of Sports, Dance and Recreaton at Radcliffe, said yesterday that the number of women enrolled in Radcliffe's Korean Karate class has not increased this semester. "In fact, we have more men than women in the class," she said.

Some women have chosen less formal safety precautions such as bicycle-riding rather than walking alone at night. "It's a lot easier to dodge an assailant when you're on a bike than when you're walking," one Radcliffe sophomore said.

Additional Protection

For additional protection, most women in Lowell and Leverett -- the only two Houses which have installed peepholes in the women's doors -- reported that they have recently become more scrupulous about using their peepholes.

Several Radcliffe women attributed their recent cautiousness to parental pressure. "My friends and I have been deluged by letters from home, replete with clippings and gory details about ill-fated hitchhikers," a junior said yesterday.

All women contacted in the survey said that they are concerned about the murders and the dangers of thumbing and being out alone at night. "Whether I change my habits or not, I'm definitely pissed off," one senior said