In 1942 the membership of the Faculty Players, a popular campus organization since 1933, was greatly reduced by participation of its members in World War II. The players abandoned their customary schedule of producing three full-length plays during the academic year and embarked on a new project, employing the theatre-in-the-round concept that was coming into vogue on college campuses. The group opened its Penthouse Theatre in the third floor ballroom of Tyson House (then serving as the Episcopal Student Center) as school commenced for 1942 and for several months offered one-act plays followed by a social hour of tea and cakes for the audience—limited to one hundred by space. Because of wartime shortages, patrons were advised to bring their own sugar for the tea. The final business meeting of the Faculty Players was on February 24, 1943. Plans were made for a spring Penthouse series, but it failed to materialize.