1911-1914

The advent of the First World War, however, brought many unprecedented academic, economic, political and social challenges and changes to life on campus and beyond. With the new challenging complex reality as a backdrop, and the extracurricular burden of producing magazines of consistently higher quality while the College and the region were undergoing major upheavals, many magazines stopped appearing, and those which did, grew shorter, more somber and succinct. Even though the College initially succeeded in retaining some freedom, thanks to the initial neutrality of the US at the beginning of the war, the formidable efforts at diplomacy that the administrators at SPC exerted with the Ottoman authorities, and the many medical services the SPC Faculty was able to provide to the Ottoman authorities during the war, the toll of being in a war zone was felt at many levels across the College. Even though unfortunately, war is rarely commented upon in these magazines during this period (Al thamarah, and the Student Union Gazette), the tone of the few magazines that continued to appear was much more somber, and serious. It was a great boost to student life when West Hall was built in 1913-1914, forming a state-of -the-art student center for social and religious activities on campus. The extra-curricular activities boomed so quickly, that the campus' social life became extremely active and democratic. Plays, musical concerts, athletic activities all had to be advertised for and the students did that by publishing announcements about these events in their magazines.