Unearthed from under centuries of dirt and cigarette butts, this Mini Stonehenge has been found in our very own Riverside Park. Archaeologists say it is an ancient mystic healing place erected by Columbia students to mend wounds (read: paper cuts) received in the great 1754 Battle of the Butler. Administration is now considering developing it as housing for transfer students.

Public Safety has sent out another Security Alert after two students were robbed on Friday night in Riverside Park. The pair “were sitting in Riverside Park between W. 115 St. and W. 116 St., when a group of males approached them and asked them where they could buy weed.  One of the suspects then displayed a black semi-automatic pistol.”

The suspects fled after taking the students’ property. They were described to Public Safety as four males in their early 20s, two black and two Hispanic. The NYPD was unable to find the suspects after a search of the area. Full alert after the jump.

UPDATE (11:45 PM): One of the victims got in touch with Bwog to say that the suspects were apprehended today. The assailants had robbed several other groups of people in the park in the past week before being caught by police. A round of applause for the NYPD, then. Read more…

Hawkmadinejad (or, more precisely, the Hawks-madinejad) has (or have) been keeping to himself (or…oh screw it) more this spring, but that hasn’t stopped Hawkmadinebwog editor Courtney Douds from documenting some of the other fine flora and fauna of the neighborhood.

The Animorphs would feel right at home in Riverside

The paradoxically-named catbird!

That tree in front of Philosophy is more interesting than you’d think.

Hippos in Riverside as well? Now we’ve seen everything!

Photo via Revart.blogs.com

Spring is upon us (which does not explain the pumpkin in the picture, but stick with us here), and, hand in hand with the warm and the wet come a New York City tradition:  flashers. 

Yesterday, Barnard Public Safety sent out yet another of its “Crime Alert” bulletins warning students of “Public Lewdness” in Riverside Park. According to Bwog’s Unofficial Flasher E-Mail Counter (trademark pending), that makes three since warm weather began in late April.

While Riverside Park has a better reputation than that park your mom made you promise not to visit, Barnard students have been falling prey to its seediness since March.  Remember, girls and boys, that the best way to protect yourself is “CONSTANT VIGILANCE.”  Full email after the jump. Read more…

All Barnard students received the following e-mail this morning about an incident in Riverside Park yesterday:

 Dear Barnard community,

 The Public Safety Department disseminated security alerts involving a B/C student who was in Riverside Park, Sunday March 22 at 1:55pm and a male  approached her and proceeded to expose himself. Please be aware and alert of your surroundings at all times.

Garrett Doherty

Public safety Supervisor

Hofstra and all NYC public schools are giving their students a snowday. Although Columbia is not joining in on the fun, there’s no better way to pretend you’re 7 and school’s canceled than a healthy dose of neighborhood sledding.

You definitely can’t steal a dining hall tray and sled down a hill with your outdoors-y type chums, or whatever it is they do at New England schools, so just head to one of the several hills in Riverside Park.There’s an especially steep hill at 116th Street, a few medium-sized ones at 107th and 108th Streets next to the dog runs, and another promising hill further down at 102nd. If you feel like traveling for your fun, Central Park sledding can be lovely if it’s not crowded, and there is also especially good sledding on the East Side in the 80′s and 90′s.

Squeeze into your snowpants and try to be as cute as Snow Baby Starfish. We triple dog dare you.

                                                                                                                           -ECS

True fact: Sarah Palin doesn’t eat babies.

Cars don’t run into you in Riverside Park.

The stock market crashed!  Now what?

Fight Club was released nine years ago.  Don’t you feel really old?  Like, over nine years old?

Columbia wants to demolish and rebuild in every direction!  Watch out Lincoln Center.

Columbia students may not like lines in John Jay, but they sure do like to spend their parents’ money!

It’s been seven years since 9/11, and the city’s firefighters still come here, to Firemen’s Memorial on 100th St. and Riverside. The Ground Zero memorial is restricted to those from FDNY 343 and their family members.

“It’s sad that an event like this has to bring us all out,” said Officer Pat McNeely, from Ottawa, explaining that the force comes together when someone dies in the line of duty.  “Word always travels really fast in this job. Someone somewhere in the city always has the pulse on some other department.” 

Hundreds of blue-suited firemen gathered, talking in low voices, with bagpipe strains in the background.

For more memorials in the city, check here.

- LBD

Conscious of spring’s glorious birth today, David Helfand, resident nutty professor of Astronomy, posed a curious question at the beginning of his Beyond the Solar System class: “Would you rather hear my prepared lecture or take a walk?” One hundred sorrowful humanities majors awoke, and Helfand led them on an impromptu adventure in Riverside Park to show “how a scientist looks at the world.” Bwog is still unsure of that, but we did gain other wisdom while tripping over fallen tree branches:

-The Hudson River isn’t actually a river… it’s a fjord! Hot!

-Move to northern Alberta (it’s a Canadian province!) in anticipation of huge shifts in the Global Climate! “It’s going to be really balmy.”

-The Day After Tomorrow’s “time scale is wrong by a factor of 1000.”

-Don’t eat eels out of the Hudson! They’re full of PCBs!

-300 million years ago, it was a 45 minute walk from here to Africa!