Kevin Castner Jr. ’24 posed this question at the end of his 2023 Stute op-ed advocating for the return of the S.S. Stevens’ anchor to campus. The anchor honored the S.S. Stevens, a floating dormitory that served students from 1967 to 1975. The Class of 1975’s gift to Stevens was a memorial created from one of the ship’s anchors. It stood for decades on Wittpenn Walk before being removed in 2019 for the construction of the University Center Complex.  

Fascinated by this unique quirk of university history, Castner lobbied Vice President for Student Affairs Sara Klein and the Student Government Association (SGA) for funds to return the anchor. He also launched and advertised an online petition to register student interest. After nearly 300 students signed, the project received the go-ahead during a December 2023 SGA meeting. 

A few months later, on April 5, the anchor was re-installed on Wittpenn Walk. (It happened right around the time a 4.8-magnitude earthquake rattled Hoboken, Castner says. “The workers joked, ‘Did we just drop the anchor?’”) The memorial, unsurprisingly, was an instant hit as a student photo op. 

“I think people really enjoy it, and it’s brought awareness to the fact that there was a floating dorm, and people loved it, and it’s a part of our history,” Castner says. “The more references to Stevens history that we can have that can’t be erased, the better.” 

– Kristin Hanson