When Collin Cutrone McMichael ’09 headed down to the laundry room in Butterfield B last Thursday, he sensed something was off. In the basement tunnel that leads to the laundry room, McMichael was shocked to find the once-grafittied walls gone, covered by two sterile white and black stripes.

“When I actually entered the tunnels I think I just stood there for a few minutes with my mouth open,” McMichael said. “Everything was gone. It was ridiculous.”

He immediately called his friends to notify them about the graffiti’s removal.

“At that point I was really pissed off that anyone would paint over the tunnels and I wanted to do something about it, I just didn’t know what,” he said.

Later that afternoon, while the paint was still drying, McMichael started a Facebook group, “KEEP WESLEYAN WEIRD,” to inform students about the tunnels.

Within hours, students headed to the tunnels and began to retag the walls.

“After we found out, I went with a group of friends to the tunnels,” said a freshman female. “We brought permanent markers and started writing messages to the administration on the walls.”

Even more students headed over to graffiti the walls that evening.

“I went down there with six cans of spray paint and a set of stencils,” a freshman male said. “I started tagging all over and was quickly joined by people I didn’t even know. It was great. It was such as awesome feeling to not only be able to undo the travesty but to share it with total strangers that felt as strongly as you did.”

For many students, the white washing destroyed one of the University’s hallmarks.

“When I found out the Butts tunnels were being repainted, I was dumbfounded,” Xue Sun ’08 said. “I was absolutely furious: seething, tooth-grindingly heart-poundingly mad. The graffiti in the tunnels is so much more than tagging and vandalism. It was as if they had intruded on sacred ground. It was insulting, like someone grabbed this integral part of Wesleyan culture and not only erased it but denied its significance in the first place.”

Many students were attracted to the University’s quirks, including the graffiti in the Butts tunnels, as high school students.

“When I was applying to and choosing colleges, one of my deciding factors was Wesleyan’s belief in expression,” Peter Hull ’10 said. “When I learned that the iconic tunnels were covered up, it scared me that maybe this reputation was losing its basis in reality. It was worrying to me that Wesleyan’s administration was trying to blur what set us apart from schools like Williams.”

Students also lamented the loss of so many memories.

“There are a lot of memories in those tunnels, and it’s a shame to see them disappear with the flick of a paintbrush,” said Joe John Sanchez ’07.

Senior Class President Arjit Sen ’07 feels the graffiti in the tunnels was also a way to connect current students to past ones.

Several students were upset to see history erased.

“Covering half of the Butterfield walls with black is like painting over Wesleyan’s traditions,” Hull said.

Student reaction to the University’s actions ranged from rage to mild frustration.

“The administration makes mistakes sometimes,” Sanchez said. “They’re human. They’re also doing the best they can do to make this university a good place, and the problems arise when students and staff don’t see eye-to-eye on the definition of ‘a good place.’”

Sanchez felt that the University’s biggest misstep was their lack of foresight.

“The painting over of the Butt tunnels was completely spontaneous and without warning,” he said. “I’m amazed they didn’t predict that we would react so strongly in response.”

Sanchez was also surprised at many of his peers’ responses to the incident.

“I was initially alarmed by how strong the student reaction was,” Sanchez said. “It seemed that this one action by the administration [painting over the tunnels] had triggered a release of a whole lot of pent-up negative vibes.”

The administration was also taken unaware by the rapid, intense student reaction. Administrators regard the re-tagging of the newly painted walls as acts of vandalism.

“I’m sure the students take as much pride in the appearance of this campus as we do and if someone vandalizes buildings or structures we endeavor to repair the damage as quickly as possible,” said Director of Media Relations David Pesci.

University staff has yet to make a final decision on this matter, but they have, at least, temporarily stopped painting the tunnels. When students heard about the provisional halt, they were overjoyed.

“I was pretty happy to hear that they had stopped — it renewed my faith in the activist spirit of the kids here,” Hull said. “I’m glad that the spirit I came to Wes for couldn’t be whitewashed away.”