CalTech tunnels
Robert Despain
started but never ran into anyone running them while I was.
Anyone got anything?
Whoops: major tunnels were used by just about everyone to get
from the residence houses to classes during rain. I'm talking
about the stuff branching off and continuing on from the
well-known routes.
Hints: one easy tunnel put you into a janitorial closet near the
library; finding a secret passage put you in the old stacks of
the Humanities library.
Hints 2: one branch put you under a part of the campus that
seemed to be solely devoted to government research -- no
buildings that had classrooms.
Hints 3: saw a really bad sci-fi movie (my brother Keith had a
bit part) that used some of the tunnel system at CIT.
Cheers,
R.O. (not quite class of '62 at noble CIT)
Heath I Hunnicutt
>Used to run these c. 1958-61. Heard this and that before I
>started but never ran into anyone running them while I was.
>Anyone got anything?
Really? And you didn't even know that it's "Caltech" instead
of "CalTech?" Interesting...
>Whoops: major tunnels were used by just about everyone to get
>from the residence houses to classes during rain. I'm talking
>about the stuff branching off and continuing on from the
>well-known routes.
'tis true enough. Moreso in the past than now.
>Hints 2: one branch put you under a part of the campus that
>seemed to be solely devoted to government research -- no
>buildings that had classrooms.
Bullshit. The only "secured" part of the tunnels here are the ones
that lead to the boiler room.
>Hints 3: saw a really bad sci-fi movie (my brother Keith had a
>bit part) that used some of the tunnel system at CIT.
Real Genius - a pretty good movie, I thought.
>Cheers,
>R.O. (not quite class of '62 at noble CIT)
This is hard to believe. I even just went to look at a Tech, and
they don't spell Caltech wrong even in the issues from the sixties.
And NOONE calls it CIT. Perhaps you went to high school in Pasadena?
Heath
chang carole suegin
>r...@unislc.slc.unisys.com (Robert Despain) writes:
>>Hints 3: saw a really bad sci-fi movie (my brother Keith had a
>>bit part) that used some of the tunnel system at CIT.
>Real Genius - a pretty good movie, I thought.
As far as I know, Real Genius didn't actually use the Tech tunnel
system. The movie was "inspired" by Tech, but the school refused to
allow any filming on campus (Why? I don't know). The tunnels shown
in the movie are not the Tech tunnels. (Of course not -- I doubt
that there is anything at Tech that look remotely like Lazlo's
retreat.)
>>Cheers,
>>R.O. (not quite class of '62 at noble CIT)
>This is hard to believe. I even just went to look at a Tech, and
>they don't spell Caltech wrong even in the issues from the sixties.
>And NOONE calls it CIT. Perhaps you went to high school in Pasadena?
And NO ONE spells "no one" as "noone." I've heard it as CIT many
times, especially in the phrase "noble CIT." I've also seen "CalTech"
many times, on-campus and off-campus. However, I will agree that
the spelling "Cal Tech" is hated by most Techers.
-carole
--
Carole Chang | "Eternal life is too short
spa...@uiuc.edu | to have to wait for a table."
| - Lacroix
I had staples! |
Simon Favre
>>Real Genius - a pretty good movie, I thought.
>As far as I know, Real Genius didn't actually use the Tech tunnel
>system. The movie was "inspired" by Tech, but the school refused to
>allow any filming on campus (Why? I don't know). The tunnels shown
>in the movie are not the Tech tunnels. (Of course not -- I doubt
>that there is anything at Tech that look remotely like Lazlo's
>retreat.)
The last movie I know of that was actually filmed on the Caltech campus
was called "The Clones". I was an extra in the background. One of the grad
students (Bruce Bennett, I believe) actually had a speaking part. The movie
was a TOTAL DOG. It wasn't even bad enough to be good. The Clones did use part
of the actual Caltech steam tunnels, as Our Hero stumbles along aimlessly out
of one lab into what was the steam plant south of California Ave, near the
playing field. The movie also had the hero climbing around on Throop Hall,
which WAS the oldest (and first) building on campus, until the '71 earthquake
in the San Fernando Valley. Throop was torn down in the fall of '72. In true
Caltech tradition, Throop had a Christmas tree on top of the cupola when the
wrecking ball hit. I suppose The Clones' only redeeming social value is the
preservation of the images of dear old Throop. The main (South) tunnels used to
connect to Throop. The Security office was in the basement of Throop. The one
object on campus most likely to be stolen was the door to the Campus Security
Office. They would usually find it on the roof of Milliken library, or some
such. It is possible The Institute (another nickname for Caltech) did not want
to be embarrased by any more bad movies.
There was also a Mission Impossible episode filmed on campus, but all they
used were exterior shots of Milliken Library, which had just been built.
---
# Simon Favre email: si...@fs11.lsil.com # Professional car nut:
# LSI Logic Corp. (My opinions, not theirs.) # 2 Alfa Romeos
# Q: "Do you always drive like this?" # 1 Vintage F. Jr.
# A: "YES!" -- Dustin Hoffman, The Graduate # 1 F150 hauler
Keith Schneider
>The last movie I know of that was actually filmed on the Caltech campus
>was called "The Clones".
Actually there have been quite a few movies filmed here since then.
The restaurant scenes in Beverly Hills Cop (II?) were filmed at the
Athenaeum (faculty club). Just this summer, Danielle Steele's _Return
From 'Nam_ was filmed here (it was shown on CBS or ABC or something).
The Ricketts dining room was changed into part of an orphanage (they
covered up the pentagram with some sort of Christian symbol). There
were shots on the Olive walk (I almost walked into a scene when getting
my mail--they built mailboxes for the students between Lloyd and Page)
and the Ath was used again...
Hmm... there were some more movies filmed here too (I remember talking
about them not too long ago, but I've forgotten them now).
keith
Strider Coyle
>The last movie I know of that was actually filmed on the Caltech campus
>was called "The Clones". I was an extra in the background. One of the grad
>There was also a Mission Impossible episode filmed on campus, but all they
>used were exterior shots of Milliken Library, which had just been built.
Parts of "The Fly II" were filmed here at Simon Fraser
University. SFU is a group of connected concrete buildings on top of a
200m (800ft) mountain surrounded by forest and cliffs. As such it
looks really neat from the air: like a think tank or top secret
research lab.
Some of the scenes in the movie involve the mutated fly
crawling around in the tunnels under this research place. Some of them
are sets, but some of the places are real. There is one scene where
the hero jumps out of an office over the Classrooom Complex into the
North Concourse, then out the doors tword the library and over the
railing. Quite a stunt.
Also, recently, an episode of "The X Files" was filmed at SFU.
Earlier, an episode was filmed at TRIUMF (a cyclotron) out at the
University Of British Columbia. I have not seen either episode.
And has anyone see the "Highlander" series? They end up having
sword fights all over Vancouver: the sulphur piles in North Van, the
Science Center on False Creek, the Burrard Bridge, the BC Pavilion.
--
Michael (Strider) Coyle mic...@sfu.ca
Simon Fraser University, Burnaby, B.C., Canada
They took all the trees and put them in a tree museum
Then they charged all the people a dollar and a half just to see them.
chang carole suegin
>The last movie I know of that was actually filmed on the Caltech campus
>was called "The Clones". I was an extra in the background. One of the grad
Actually, there have been a number of things filmed at Tech (this is
getting a bit off-subject for this group, but it's a fun discussion).
While I was at Tech, probably during 1986, they did some scenes for
Beverly Hill Cop II. The original movie had scenes filmed on campus
(that one scene where Eddie Murphy went into that posh restaurant
looking for someone was filmed in the Athenaeum), but I don't know
when that was. The one scene that I watched being filmed was done
in Fleming (and partly in Dabney). It was done in the open-air hallway
that connects the two houses. The scene involved Eddie Murphy, Judge
Reinhold, and that older guy breaking into a house. They built a
fake facade of a house in Fleming for this scene. It was pretty
weird (I mean, couldn't they have just found some stage in Hollywood
and built a facade?).
Another thing I saw filmed at Tech (summer of '86) was MacGyver. It's
funny -- one day, I was flipping channels on my friend's TV at Tech
(probably the one time I watched TV at Tech), and I saw that
particular episode, and yelled out, "Hey! That's Noyes!" It was
the episode in which he and his Damsel-in-Distree-du-Jour were
being chased by robots (why, I don't know). At one point, they
were trapped in this lab-looking area, trying to hide behind
lab benches. That was in the building which houses the Chem 3a and
Chem 4a-b labs. Also in the episode, there was a room full of
computers (fake computers, with fancy lights blinking all over
them). That was a room in Noyes, converted by the TV guys just
for that purpose.