The students who orchestrated last week’s takeover of Columbia University’s Hamilton Hall left behind a series of charts, maps and supply lists that detail the extensive planning behind the brief occupation.
Photos shared exclusively with Gothamist reveal the protesters’ hand-drawn schematics mapping out entire floors of the building, locations of supplies, doors they wanted to barricade, and the locations of water fountains and fire extinguishers.
A “task list” included to-dos like “set up pulley,” “lock all windows,” “security shifts,” and “role [sic] call.” A hand-drawn map of the building’s third floor indicated that room 313 had been designated the “smoking room.” Another list was titled “Heavy Equipment Locations” and noted rooms with “tons of books,” “large tables,” “tall ladder” and “portable podium/table.” In all caps, the list also included the following note: “3rd floor windows in need of blockade.”
Left: A hand-drawn map of stairways and entrances at Hamilton Hall left behind by protesters who occupied the building. Right: A list of “heavy supplies” like tables and books, along with room locations.
Henry Clemente
Mayor Eric Adams and NYPD officials have over the last week said that outside agitators directed protests at Columbia and NYU.
“There is definitely a mastermind behind this,” NYPD Deputy Commissioner of Operations Kaz Daughtry claimed in a video posted to social media on May 3.
But Henry Clemente, a head custodian at Columbia who works the overnight shift at the Morningside Heights campus, suggested that the operation was much more organic. Clemente, who shared the photos exclusively with Gothamist, has been cleaning and making repairs in the building since police cleared it on April 30.
The map of the third floor of Hamilton Hall left by student activists featured a key and designated a smoking room.
Henry Clemente
“These are smart kids,” he said. “A lot of kids come from different backgrounds, where one might be into engineering and one might be political… And they all got together and did this.”
Several of Clemente’s photos show the wreckage left in the wake of the protester’s occupation of the building and the ensuing NYPD raid. The mess included chairs zip-tied together and piled high to block a staircase. Sleeping bags and signs bearing protest slogans were littered throughout the academic building. Doors were busted by NYPD officers who forced their way into every room to check for students.
Left: A bullet hole in a door frame at Hamilton Hall left behind by an NYPD sergeant who the Manhattan District Attorney’s office says accidentally fired his gun while entering the building. Right: Chairs stacked up to form a barricade in a stairway at Hamilton Hall.
Henry Clemente
One photo shows the bullet hole left by an NYPD sergeant who accidentally fired his gun while entering Hamilton Hall, according to the Manhattan district attorney’s office. NYPD officials said the sergeant accidentally fired the gun while attempting to use a flashlight.
The shot appears to have hit a glass doorway. The NYPD said the bullet struck a wall.
Clemente estimates that repairs to the building — including an elevator that was taken out of service and windows that were barricaded — will cost the university millions of dollars. He said he and his team have been working on those repairs and fixing other damage around the property.
“It’s been a lot of vandalism on the buildings around the campus on the back of campus, you know, and [the] facilities [department] has to clean it,” he said. “It’s kind of dangerous, you don’t know who’s putting stuff up and how they can react to you taking it down,” referring to the graffiti written on the walls.
Henry Clemente
Clemente said he was watching last Tuesday when police rolled in en masse to arrest the students who had taken over in Hamilton Hall. Even though he’s a military veteran who once worked as an auxiliary police officer, he said the sheer number of officers was “scary.”
“Just seeing the amount of police, you know… I kind of felt unsafe,” he said.
But Clemente also said he believes NYPD’s operation to clear out the building was necessary.
“It could have been anyone in there, you know,” he said. “It’s not about putting students down or even suppressing voices. It’s more about the safety of everyone on campus.”
He said he received a call around midnight telling him that protesters had trapped four of his staff members trapped inside the building. Those workers have announced plans to sue the university for failing to protect them.
“It was pretty scary to hear that they were taken hostage even for a moment, because one moment might seem like an eternity when you don’t know who’s doing what,” Clemente said.
Transport Workers Union President John Samuelsen sent a letter to Columbia University President Minouche Shafik on Monday, saying the treatment of the workers was “appalling.” The union represents faculty workers on the campus.
Protesters used all sorts of equipment to barricade doors at Columbia’s Hamilton Hall.
Henry Clemente
“The custodians directly informed the occupiers that they wished to immediately leave the building and were informed by at least one smarmy, sanctimonious, elitist…occupier, in a direct reference to the Gaza protests and subsequent occupation of Hamilton Hall, that there was no chance of leaving because ‘this moment is bigger than you,’” Samuelsen wrote.
While Clemente said he’s experienced a slew of on-campus protests during his 17 years working at Columbia, he said he’s never seen anything like last week’s occupation of Hamilton Hall.
“Columbia has been promoting and celebrating the 1968 protests for years,” he said.
“But, the way things happen now, this is a post 9/11 time. We’ve been through so much as a country and as a city. Certain things can’t be tolerated because you have outside influences coming in… America has a lot of enemies.”
He said he views the whole experience as a big learning opportunity for everyone on campus.
“We’re going forward, trying to bring normality and security to the university, and just assure that [the occupation] won’t happen again,” he said.