Sanctuary Will Move to Iroquois Club

The old gives way to the new, and today Sanctuary takes over the building at 74 Mt. Auburn St. previously occupied by the Iroquois Club, which is closing due to financial difficulties.

Sanctuary, which offers counseling and temporary living quarters to street people, will lease the building from the Iroquois Club until June 9, when Harvard will buy the former clubhouse. After June 9, Sanctuary will lease the building directly from the University for $500 plus utilities and taxes per month, according to John Marquand, chairman of the board of directors of Sanctuary and Allston Burr Senior Tutor in Dudley House.

Harvard purchased the building for a reported $135,000. The University and Sanctuary have agreed to a five-year lease, which either can terminate "upon sufficient notice," Marquand said yesterday.

Marquand also said that William A.Coolidge '24 donated Harvard $35,000 on the condition that it rent the building to Sanctuary.

"We're shooting for an opening time of late June. Counseling operations and crisis services will be located on the first floor where the bar used to be. The hostel will be on the second floor if we can afford to install enough new plumbing," Marquand said.

Bill Brasch, a member of the club and a former graduate student at Harvard, said last night its closing was "a reflection of present life styles. Clubs just aren't making it these days. The trend will soon overtake the strongest clubs."

Brasch said that, in addition to financial pressures, the club closed because of the concern of its members for wasted facilities. "There are 70,000 square feet in the building. The membership felt that Harvard could make better use of the building than we were. And, certainly, we're not opposed to Sanctuary. We rented them the building last summer at a pittance," he said.

Representatives of the 30 present members of Iroquois are negotiating with other clubs for a merger. "The Iroquois treasury would be a dowry," Brasch said.