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| - The first Barrington Hall was a boarding house on Ridge Road, housing 48 students, purchased by leaders of the student co-op movement in 1933. Located at 2315 Dwight Way, at Ellsworth, the better-known, second building was opened to house 200 men in 1935, two years after the founding of the USCA. The building was leased to the U.S. Navy from 1943 to 1948; the Navy returned the building significantly upgraded. Barrington Hall, along with all the USCA residences, was always open to all students regardless of race, religion or nationality. In 1967, Barrington Hall's house council voted to become co-ed, which by the rules of "locus parentis" meant the house lost its accreditation with the University.
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| abstract
| - The first Barrington Hall was a boarding house on Ridge Road, housing 48 students, purchased by leaders of the student co-op movement in 1933. Located at 2315 Dwight Way, at Ellsworth, the better-known, second building was opened to house 200 men in 1935, two years after the founding of the USCA. The building was leased to the U.S. Navy from 1943 to 1948; the Navy returned the building significantly upgraded. Barrington Hall, along with all the USCA residences, was always open to all students regardless of race, religion or nationality. In 1967, Barrington Hall's house council voted to become co-ed, which by the rules of "locus parentis" meant the house lost its accreditation with the University. In the 80s, the co-op was the focus of numerous accusations regarding drugs and noise. In 1989, after three previous attempts to close the hall, all defeated within the USCA by campaigns organized by Barringtonians and former Barringtonians, it was closed by a USCA referendum intended to stem the growing liability associated with Barrington's wild atmosphere. The closure was fought by the residents during the referendum campaign, in court and in the building by student squatters. The squat climaxed in a night-long riot — in March, 1990, which began as a poetry reading — involving Berkeley police, off-duty police officers (hired by the USCA), and the residents. Throughout its history, Barrington Hall had a reputation for supporting social and political activism. In 1960, "Cal undergrads, particularly residents of the Barrington Hall co-op on Dwight Way, were part of the crowd of demonstrators protesting against the San Francisco meeting of the House Committee on Un-American Activities." By the time of the People's Park Riots in May of 1969, Barrington Hall, which was only two blocks from People's Park, was an infamous place in Berkeley. The devotion to cooperation in a nation committed to competition bore radical fruit after thirty-five years. Barrington became a 'safe house' for deviance, good or ill. It was safe for unmarried men and women to live together, safe to paint and draw on the walls, safe to do or sell any drug, safe to crash in if you had no other place to stay. In the 1970s and 1980s, it was also the headquarters of the anti-apartheid movement, and offered sanctuary and meals to the homeless. In 1984, Barrington residents voted to make the Hall open as an official sanctuary for refugees from El Salvador. The former Barrington Hall now serves as privately operated student housing.
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