Just hours after she said, “I do,” during her March 2018 ceremony, Jenelle Selig Olson ’15 and her new husband and college sweetheart, Erick Olson ’12, were twirling around the dance floor of Great Hall in Memorial Union. Little did she know her husband had planned for a special guest to stop by their reception: Buckingham U. Badger.

“Bucky was definitely a highlight,” Jenelle says. “Not knowing he’s coming, and then [you] turn around and some Bucky is there dancing with you — that’s just awesome. Also, you can’t beat the Terrace.”

The Union’s first wedding, between Fang Chu and Tsao Shih Wang ’27, MA’28, PhD’29 in May 1929, was likely a smaller affair. Nowadays, Union weddings are so popular that the UW has two full-time wedding planners and an intern who coordinate the days’ many facets.

Hopeful couples enter a lottery 18 months in advance. When their names are pulled, they can pick from available dates and venues — Tripp Commons, Great Hall, or Varsity Hall at Union South. During the academic year, school events take priority, but the Union can host up to nine weddings in a single summer weekend, notes Hattie Paulin, the Union’s wedding director.

Leading up to the event, Paulin sends checklists, arranges tastings, and sometimes plays therapist to stressed-out couples and family members. The Union only requires that couples pay a small event fee and use its catering services. Everything else can be customized, from the chef preparing family recipes to the waitstaff dressing as Disney characters.

The Union was the first venue Jenelle considered after she and Erick got engaged. Because she served as Paulin’s intern while she was earning her engineering degree, Jenelle knew how much care Union staff put into planning and executing a wedding day.

“The staff knows the true meaning of having a wedding there, and what it means to me and my family, and it was just a huge weight off my shoulders,” Jenelle says.

Of course, there are always last-minute glitches that no one anticipates, Paulin says. But with a game plan and some professional guidance, couples are able to enjoy a day dedicated to their love story.

“The couple can sit back and look and say, ‘Wow, this is awesome,’ ” she says. “ ‘This is exactly what we wanted it to be.’ ”

The sunburst design — perhaps Madison’s most recognizable symbol — sparks fond memories of times spent hanging out with friends and gazing at Lake Mendota’s many moods.

Following the Union’s years of renovation, staff and student leaders decided to start a new tradition. Since 2016, they’ve invited eager students and community members to join the fun of opening the Terrace and populating it with the green, yellow, and orange chairs.

Sometime in early April (depending on the weather, but it’s often a little chilly), Union staff puts out a call for Terrace lovers to prepare for the chairs’ return. Volunteers line up an hour in advance, waiting for facilities staff to unload trucks and line the chairs up along the side of the building.

With a signal given via megaphone, volunteers carry the chairs down to the Terrace, passing by members of the always-entertaining Badger Band and a very happy Bucky Badger.

The sunburst season has officially begun.

“Terrace season means it’s time to start building connections, having a good time, running into past friends, and enjoying some sun,” says Iffat Bhuiyan ’18, last year’s Wisconsin Union student president.

The final touch to the day? Free Babcock Dairy ice cream and the first of many relaxing times on the Terrace.

Cards

1928

In the Union’s opening year, men play cards in Der Rathskeller. It was only men in those days — the Rath wouldn’t be open to women until 1941.

UW Archives S0386

1965

In the 1960s, campus had grown increasingly political, and the Union evolved along with the students. Union Director Porter Butts ’26 etired in 1968 and was replaced by Ted Crabb ’54, who served until 2001. But in Der Rathskeller, students still passed the time with card games.

Bowling

1944

U.S. Navy sailors mansplain a bowling ball to female students. During World War II, the Union’s dining facilities served more than 2,000 military personnel daily. But the drop in male students meant opportunity for women — the Union’s first female president, Carolyn Hall Sands ’44, was elected in 1943.

2010

Two students experiment with human bowling in Memorial Union’s Tripp Commons. There was no real bowling in Memorial Union when it opened, and there isn’t any today. In 1939, eight lanes were added under the theater wing. They closed in 1970, shortly before Union South opened.

Arcade

1975

Foosball is older than the Union, having been invented in the United Kingdom in 1921. It reached peak popularity in the United States in the 1970s. Shorts were not to be seen in the Union until 1954, however, when a change to the dress code allowed shorts in the cafeteria and Der Rathskeller and on the Terrace.

2009

Students play video games (Super Smash Bros. Brawl) in Der Rathskeller. Video games are a rarity in Memorial Union today. Arcade revenue declined from the 1980s into the 2000s, and the games room closed in 2008.

Billiards

1936

Pool tournaments were held in the old Billiards Room, which was part of the original Union. A remodel in 1962 turned the Billiards Room into Der Stiftskeller, and the pool tables were moved to the basement. They later came back.

2014

Students play pool in Der Stiftskeller, which was named for a thousand-year-old restaurant in Salzburg, Austria. The murals were added to its walls in 1978.

Chess

1980s

Students play chess on the Terrace. The Union first made Terrace chairs available for purchase in 1982, though you can only buy red or white, not the traditional green, yellow, and orange.

2014

A chess game enlivens an August evening on the Terrace. Some things change very little.

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A self-described student, India’s Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru was pleased to end his three-and-a-half week U.S. tour with a talk before a scholarly audience at the UW on November 4, 1949. And the university was equally pleased, welcoming the leader of India’s struggle for independence with a full diplomatic affair.

A ceremony at the Union Theater fêted Nehru. (That’s him on the balcony, in the upper left corner of this picture.) Accompanied by his daughter, India’s future prime minister Indira Gandhi, he celebrated the example of political nonviolence inspired by Mahatma Mohandas Gandhi.

Fifty Indian students led the first-ever campus performance of India’s national anthem, and WHA and radio networks broadcast the program across Wisconsin and Michigan.

UW President E. B. Fred declared Nehru’s visit memorable for its scholarship and exchange with a nation where “the true aristocrat is a man of learning.” In official state greetings, Governor Oscar Rennebohm found similarities between Wisconsin and India. “We know the meaning of Gandhi’s noble work, the resolved way of peace,” he said. “We, too, are a heterogeneous people, with different mother tongues, religions, and cultures. Like you, we, too, are learning to dwell together in peace.”

At a time when conflict among nations can be blood soaked (see “The Warlord’s Biographer” on page 34), and resolving it requires innovation in many forms, the UW’s Rikhil Bhavnani is among those revisiting Gandhi’s legacy. The assistant professor of political science, along with research colleague Saumitra Jha at Stanford University, is finding that countries may still have much to learn from what they call “Gandhi’s Gift.”

In 1949, Nehru’s message — “Means are always as important as the ends” — came through a wide-ranging address. “[With] all the world its neighbor, no country can be indifferent to what happens at the other end of the world,” he said. “[Pure] indifference and isolation are completely past and over. … We realize that in India. There is no way left except world cooperation.”