Buckley field

General Information

If you have ever had the chance to visit Drexel University's Main campus there's a good chance you came across Buckley Field, an area of artificial turf used for various outdoor student activities.

Taking back Buckley!

I am about to begin my senior year at Drexel, but when I first arrived here as a freshman the field was not surrounded by fence as it is today. By creating a recreation area uninhibited by proximity card fences, the university effectively created a hot spot for soccer fans throughout the Philadelphia area. What this meant for tuition paying Drexel students was the fact that they would have to compete with a diverse array of decidedly non-Drexel people to get access to the field.

Throughout the year this was a phenomenon my friends and I dealt with in frustration. Eventually by the time Spring Quarter started winding down, we felt compelled to take action against these undeserving field stealers. One night we devised an ingenius plan involving water balloons, a huge elastic water balloon launcher, and some unsuspecting soccer players. We commenced to filling a back pack with as many water balloons as possible. By the time this was finished it was late enough where our actions could be concealed by the cover of darkness.

Buckley is well lit at night, surrounded by lamp posts that automatically turn on at twilight. When night has set in the bright environment of Buckley makes it difficult for your eyes to adjust to see things happening in the unlit, dark areas that surround the field. One such place is Buckley Green, the sand volleyball courts located directly across the street from Buckley Field. The volleyball courts are a few feet lower than the sidewalk next to it, creating a perfect trench-like recession from which to launch balloons.

The balloon launcher was manned by my friend as I took the liberty of loading and firing the first shot. We aimed the launcher so that the balloons would shoot up as high as possible, with the hope that this would add to the confusion of soccer players in determining where these things were coming from. As luck would have it the first shot was a direct hit, blasting water all over the shoulder of my target. We then proceeded to lauch a few more shots with tenative caution. Eventually this caution was thrown to the wind as we recklessly engaged in a minute of non-stop, continuous balloon hurling. Before we knew it there were wet soccer players running towards the street, having figured out that the balloons were coming from the two laughing idiots across the street by the volleyball courts. At that point instinct kicked in -the human body's fight or flight response- and we chose to flee considering how the numbers didn't really work in our favor. And that is how this story came to an end, but interestingly enough, the following year Drexel put up the proximity fences to keep non-Drexel people out, essentially putting an end to water balloon hostilities of this nature.