members in the war, and their sacrifice is commemorated by a plaque located in the "Great Room." Reopening in 1919, Charter quickly gained a reputation as a club personifying the era of the Roaring '20s, carving a niche for itself on campus in the inter-war years. World War II saw Charter closing along with all of its peer institutions, as members almost universally went off to fight abroad. Charter greatly expanded its membership after the war, but disaster struck closer to home in 1949 when a fire spread rapidly through much of the first and second floors causing heavy damage. A fire marshal summoned to the scene of the fire, on seeing the facade of Charter seemingly unaffected, declared famously, "I have never seen a building survive a fire like this, nothing is indestructible, but this place is damn near." Charter's membership has since often referred to it as "The Indestructible Charter Club," or simply "The Indestructible." Charter was known throughout the 1950s and 1960s for its hard partying ways—Charter parties were only rivaled at the time by those at perennial animal house Cannon Club. It is suspected, but not known, that at least one Charter member rode with members of Cap and Gown Club in the so-called Great Train Robbery of '63, in which the "dinky" train running from Princeton Junction into Princeton was forced to make a dramatic emergency stop after a car was seen on the tracks, at which point ersatz cowboys rode up to the train on horseback and carried off their dates who had been arriving for the weekend. The greatest era of the Eating Clubs was beginning to fade by the late 1960s, however, and looking to prop up stagnating membership figures, Charter announced that it would accept female members, over the objection of many members of the grad board, shortly after the university made the switch to coeducation. In 1977, Charter made the switch from bicker selectivity to sign-in openness in order to draw more members. The club remained financially stable throughout the 1970s, 1980s, and 1990s, as six of its peers shut their doors permanently. Throughout this tumultuous period, Charter never quite lost its carefree atmosphere and wild touch—best exemplified perhaps by the infamous Initiation Night of 1988. In 1988, Charter counted as members most of the Varsity Football Team, including many of the '89 section's officers. It was some of these