For the Old Timers. What was it like living in Tiger Stadium?

I bet it was a kick in the ole pants

Stadium Rat has posted his TS dorm life experience several times

I lived in West Stadium. It was a dump in 1972. As for the games, I was in Tiger Band, so I was long gone from my dorm and with the band when we marched into the stadium.

It sucked having to go move your car every Friday night to a different lot.

Lived in North Stadium there one year (junior year) 1984-85. We called it "The Rock" (like Alcatraz).

--Game days were kind of neat, and very different. We'd go in and out of the dorm entrance all day long and hang out in the dorm until game time; we would open our dorm windows and look at all the folks milling about on N. Stadium Drive pre-game... had to make arrangements with roommate if either he or I wanted to bring a girl back to the dorm after the game for some monkey business... security was not a thing back then; I guess pretty much anyone could have gone into the dorm if they wanted to use the bathroom or something back then.

--Hall bathrooms only; thankfully RIGHT when we were moving in they added stalls to the rows of toilets and showers. Before that it was wide open for anyone in that big bathroom to see when you were taking a dump or a shower.

-- Shower heads were low-flow; someone broke one or removed it and it just had a nice strong flow of water coming out of the pipe/tube that didn't spread like a shower does. That became the preferred shower stall, and those on the floor took to calling taking a shower in that stall "running the tube".

-- NO air-conditioning, but at least ceiling fans were put in the year before. With the ceiling fan and the windows open, it wasn't that bad other than the first few weeks and the last couple of weeks of the academic year. It was, however, worse than Pentagon where I lived the following year, because Pentagon dorms had higher ceilings than North Stadium.

-- At night, with the windows open, we would often hear Mike the Tiger roaring across the street. Sometimes he would roar so loud he would wake us. One of the coolest memories of living there.

-- There were a couple of openly gay students living on our floor; the rest of the guys on the floor treated them okay and didn't give them any problems and would talk to them. My roommate and I once played a racquetball doubles games against them; before the game he and I referred to the game as "the heteros vs. the homos" and swore we wouldn't lose, so as to uphold the good name of straight men everywhere. We defeated them pretty easily.

-- We had meals in the basement cafeteria of Hatcher Hall. One of the female on-campus job student workers there we first called "Milk Lady". But she actually became part of our group and would go with us to see shows, go to parties with us, etc.

-- I NEVER got up in time for breakfast at the dining hall. but our RA (who also became a good friend) would always come down to our room, bang on our door and get my roommate to go, but only on those days when the Hatcher cafeteria was serving pancakes, with this simple phrase:(knock knock knock) "STEVE!!!! CAKES!!!"

-- We got cable in the spring semester in the dorms.

I lived in North Stadium during the mid 60's. Great atmosphere outside the stadium on game days and could observe everything from my room. One guy always had his stereo blaring from his window, always playing In a Goda Davida! The great times were Friday afternoon and night freshmen games when we could sit right behind the bench and sit behind the opponents bench and harass them, especially Tulane and Ole Miss! There were easy ways that people who didn't have id's could sneak into the stadium through the dorm areas! Great times from long ago!!!

I lived in North Stadium (1980 - 5th floor) my first semester. It was wild. No AC and barely any heat. Egging campus police - dropping watermelons - lots of drinking and other stuff. Occasional fights. Animal House had come out and everyone was trying to emulate the movie. Crazy days - not sure how I survived it.

I used to explore all around there when I was there in the 90s. The older stadium dorms, not occupied then, we’re incredibly Spartan living. Bare bones. Then on the East side of the stadium was a bunch of old 70s-80s era meeting rooms, lounges etc. Cool times.

There was an old rusted car under Tiger Staduim in the early eighties, when I did work there, not sure what that was about. And I watched basketball players like Ricky Blanton running laps on the football field. And remember Wille Gault running back a kick or punt for Tenn. The game that stood out was Aub, the earthquake game. Damn it was loud.

Third floor North Stadium. No AC but mostly shaded by big trees. Heater was one of those old radiator types that made it way too hot. Big rooms. Can always say I lived in TS. Remember yelling down at Jerry Stovall “we live you Jerry” at an impromptu press interview on the ground the day he was fired. Most memorable though was Mike IV roaring at night after he slept all day. Was probably only a hundred yards from me, and the windows were always open due to no AC. Made the hair on the back of my neck stand up.