Everyone knows Griff.
    Everyone knows Bonas.
    Or do they?
    One thing for certain, Bonaventure and Griff have grown up together.
    Griff attended school here from 1916-1919, majoring in arts, then remaining to work at the University.  Now he's part of the establishment.
    Calling himself "a roving delegate," Griff claims to be "the last link to the Old Bonas," something he holds very close to him.  A good deal of Bonaventure property was purchased from Griff, including the eastern half of the golf course.
    The Standard Oil Company sold 150 acres to the college in the early 1930's.  The boundaries were then east of the administration building to radio station WHDL; from there, straight back to the river.
    Now the boundaries include supplemental land from the western side of the of the fence by WHDL, back to the river, from the railroad tracks back to the river, a total of 500 acres.
    Griff owns land straight across from the administration building, which from 1946-56 was used to house married students.  There were several four-unit buildings; three families lived in each unit.  Some children who lived in "diaper row: have since graduated from Bonaventure, including Mark Tuohey '68, Student State President 1967-68.
    Griff says each building on campus has its own story.
    "About six years ago, there was a train depot, near where Shay-Loughlen is now.  Next to it was the original baseball field.  It had a stand and everything," he recalls.
    An old football stadium stood six or seven years ago, where Hopkins Hall stands.  The $100,000 stadium, a gift from Olean mayor Fred Forness, was built in 77 days in 1946.  It served as the training grounds for the NFL's Pittsburgh Steelers.  After years of collegiate grid iron action, the sport was discontinued in the Fall of 1951.  Six years later, the old football field was demolished, and the modern administration building erected.
    Behind De La Roche was the brick Alumni Hall, built in 1888.  The church-like structure housed students' activities.  The University library was here before the completion of Friedsam Memorial in 1938.  After years of use, the antiquated Alumni Hall was condemned, and the building razed in 1963.
    McRay House stood behind De La Roche.  For years the Friars' Fraternity used this seven-room building.  It was demolished several years ago.
    The Franciscan Institute was originally a music hall; in 1934 the music hall was abandoned and  used as a Guidance Center.  That was removed five years ago.  The Franciscan Institute and Fraternity are now on the second floor of the University Center (Reilly Center.)  Where these two buildings stood in the parking lot.
    "Hickey Hall was first called the Annex.  It was built in 1910 and was originally for parents of students when they came to visit.  Later it was a convent, and finally, used by students."
    There was a building behind the Hall called the "stalls" (used for cattle) which, according to Griff, was "the last of the old buildings."  It was taken down in 1909.  Barns were built in 1931 to house some of the cattle the University shipped in from Kansas and Texas.
    Before Devereux was built, that area was used as a horse barn.  "The barn was moved back to where Robinson is," Griff remarked, "but then it was burned down.  It was eventually rebuilt in 1931.  Later it was moved on rollers back to where the barns destroyed in the October fire stood.
    "There was a long tin building where the Post Office is now," continued our roving delegate, "that was used as a hot house.  That was built in the mid-1920's.  Back there is a little room in the barn which is our hot house now.  The rifle range was originally pig pens."  The college kept 700 head of cattle, and 65 pigs as a large part of its food supply during its younger, "leaner" days.
    A ROTC building was built in 1936 by the boiler room but in 1946 it was turned into barracks.  Eventually they were taken down.
    Four floors to the original De La Roche?
    "Well, students used to live on the fourth floor in De La Roche, until a student smoked in bed and it burned (1908).  After the fire they rebuilt it (1909) including the steeple with its clock.  It was named Lunch Hall at the time.  Then there was another fire (1933), when it was struck by lightning.  So they just refinished three stories.
    With 1916 came the completion of Butler Memorial Gymnasium.   
    Fire hit the campus in the 1930's three times, destroying: --the original college building which housed the church and monastery.  All that remains of the old church is the statue of the Blessed Virgin Mary in the cul-de-sac with the inscription at the base: "The Lord gave 1855.  The Lord took away 1930.  --the barns.  --Lynch Hall (now De La Roche).
    Destruction gave way to construction and an expanding university.  Lynch Hall was rebuilt, minus the fourth floor, and renamed De La Roche, after the Franciscan discoverer of oil in Cuba, New York 300 years ago.  In the middle '50's came the addition of Robinson-Falconio Hall.  
    Christ the King Seminary, named by Pope Pius XI in 1932, was completed in 1952.
    Bonas' unofficial historian recalls some of the more unusual days in the school's annals:
    "Bonas used to have its own railroad, you know."  Griff recalls the switch in front of Butler Gym.  The tracks originally went into Olean, Allegany and Salamanca.  This was later changed.  The switch ran only from the main line track to the back of the boiler room.  In 1947, the tracks were gone and trucks were used.  St. Bonaventure College (it was not granted university status until 1950) was connected by a spur with the Olean Railway line late in 1891.  This enabled the trolley to deliver goods as well as passengers to the campus.  
    Two events helped close the trolley system down: in 1928 the trolley company went bankrupt and in the same year, the Empire Tannery in Olean burned down.
    The Armour Meat Company owned the Tannery.  They had a locomotive.  Fr. Thomas Plassmann, OFM, then President, decided to buy it.  It meant the death of the trolley and the birth of the St. Bonaventure Limited, that opened in 1929.  
    Griff would sometimes aid the locomotive in winter when it would jump the tracks, it just couldn't make hills, with his team of horses.  Often he and Andy Boser, who later became an engineer, shoveled snow drifts off the tracks.
    Fr. Tom nominated and elected himself president of the St. Bonaventure Railroad.  He was the only clergyman in America who headed a standard gauge line.  This 300-yard line railroad was considered the shortest standard gauge line in the history of New York State.  After 10 years, the engine became hazardous to operate.  So in 1939 the Limited was sold to an Olean junkman. 
    One unusual era in Bonas' history had come to an end.
    From the laying of the first building's cornerstone in 1856, to the proposed plans of expansion ($10,000,000 in five years), the physical aspects of Bonas have changed drastically from the wilderness community Nicholas Devereux envisioned.  Inevitably, it will change, as any dream does.