Students participate in House Crawl
Hundreds of Central Michigan University students and others living within the area gathered for a house crawl on April 18 in the parking lot of Main Street Apartments.
Masses of students wandered from party to party on Main, Douglas and University streets for "House Crawl 2015" on Saturday.
More than 450 of them bought t-shirts and wristbands for the crawl, started by a group of students students through a closed Facebook group.
Starting at noon Saturday, the crawl consisted of parties at several houses and apartments on Main, Douglas and University Streets. Many students said they heard about the event on social media throughout last week.
"It was all over Twitter and you could invite whoever you wanted on Facebook," said Coldwater sophomore Emma Larsen.
Students could purchase T-shirts for $15 and wristbands for $5. Rockford senior Patrick Hartnett, who lives in one of the hosting spots for the crawl, said the funds raised through T-shirt and wristband sales went toward buying alcohol for the parties. Students who didn't buy shirts or wristbands could still attend, but could not drink the provided alcohol. Each location hosted about 400 students.
"Alcohol is provided for people who are 21 and up," he said. "We've been checking everyone's IDs. There are signs at every house."
Hartnett said the Facebook group started with only 100 people, but due to heavy student interest, owners of each house started to worry about police presence.
"The cops came and we were a little nervous, but they kind of just hung out for a little bit," he said. "They know we've been being responsible."
Officer Jeff Browne of the Mount Pleasant Police Department said there was a large fight in the area and the department handled several loud music complaints.
"The warmer weather definitely contributes to more students outside," Browne said.
Funds for alcohol were divided amongst participating houses. Grand Rapids junior Mark Stump said the alcohol bought for one of the parties ran out very quickly.
"People could still buy wristbands at the party and give us money," Stump said. "We had about 10 half gallons at each house and we bought 10 thirty-packs."
Students played music, swung on hammocks and socialized at parties growing in size at each new location. Some students took to dancing on truck beds, climbing over cars and on nearby roofs.
