When walking through the center of Western’s campus, beware the tripping monster lurking at random places underground, which pushes up bricks just when a student's foot is about to pass over.

Complete with lots of foot traffic, the Skyviewing Sculpture and a massive fountain, Red Square is the centerpiece of Western's campus, built atop a shifting peat bog that causes its red bricks to shift, often tripping students.

"If the Old Main quadrangle formed the gracious formal entrance to Western, Red Square was conceived as its living room—a place where people could walk, sit and stage fiestas, sit-ins and fairs," Lynne Masland and Linda Smeins wrote in their article, "The Campus Beautiful: A Century of Planning and Design at Western."

The fountain provides a fine mist from the 11 gushing jets in the center that shoot upwards a shifting 15 feet and meeting in the center at the highest point.

"It’s a good place for community because so many students live off-campus," Western student Stephanie Sargent said. "The only thing I don’t like is that the fountain’s lopsided. It makes me sad."

Sargent and fellow Western student Lindsey Elstad were sitting directly in the mist's path on the stone ledge surrounding the pool of water.

In the winter season, the fountain is always a gray, empty affair, usually being rained on. The contrast between seasons on campus can be drastic.

The square has seen its share of eclectic events including a human chess match, a mass moment of silence shortly after Martin Luther King, Jr. was assassinated and the start of a Vietnam War protest that closed I-5 when students blocked the interstate.

Jeff Jewell, a photo archivist at the Whatcom Museum of History and Art, said the moment of silence for King, that was held in 1968, was the first official event on Red Square.

The urgency Western felt to hold the moment of silence was so great that the event happened before the square’s construction was completed.

The initial plans for designing Red Square did not pan out well, Jewell said. The idea was to use a complicated system of pathways separated by patches of grass to connect students between buildings.

"The concept was this big, weird stringy thing," Jewell said. "They gave up on it because it was such a mess."

A portion of Red Square on the west side of the fountain is designated as Western’s Free Speech Zone, where the free exchange of ideas is fostered.

 Students and other non-campus groups are often seen at tables there.

These groups are almost guaranteed an audience with the many potentially interested onlookers who will walk by between classes.

Having a physical presence, however, is not the only

way to get one’s message across in Red Square.

According to campus policy, students may write in water-soluble, non-toxic chalk on the bricks as long as they leave room for others to do likewise. The bricks are cleaned every Friday.

There are stipulations to the rule – one cannot go Red Square-chalking willy-nilly. Chalking is only allowed on the ground and not on any walls or artwork. Also, chalking rights are put on hold when big campus events are happening on the square. Companies are prohibited from advertising in chalk on the square.

Another university policy concerning Red Square events is that they do not interfere with classes.

The info fair is an important annual Red Square event, said Western’s Operations Manager Greg McBride. The next info fair will be on Sept. 22 and 23.

Campus organizations and community businesses gather at the square for the fair, and are ready to provide information about what they do.

Though he admits it can be a lot to take in, McBride said the info fair is one of the best ways to learn more about Western and Bellingham.

Big names in music have graced Red Square’s uneven ground.

The Decemberists, a pop band from Portland, played on Red Square last spring.

The Black Eyed Peas, Mix Master Mike, Maktub, Mudhoney and other well-known acts have played Red Square.

Besides concerts, Jewell said other events happened at Red Square that were of particular interest.

Jewell recalled Western janitors mud-wrestling, as well as former Western President Robert Ross making Texas-style chili and ladling it out himself to hungry students.

Other protests besides the one inspired by the Vietnam War have occurred at the square, including one spurred by Robert Kennedy’s assassination in 1968 and another for the deaths of four Kent State University students who were killed by the Ohio National Guard in 1970.

Some student groups chose to be civil about the way they spread their message by distributing paperwork and pins for example. Others chose to be shocking.

Associated Students club Western for Life invited the Genocide Awareness Project to Red Square for a third time last spring.

By displaying a large banner that showed pictures of aborted fetuses intermixed with pictures of hate crimes, the project’s goal was to show how abortion is similar to hate crimes and genocide.

Although Western may not support the causes being promoted on Red Square, the school will ban anyone from expressing themselves in a civil manner, McBride said.

"Western values free speech so that’s what you’ll find there," McBride said.