College-affiliated retirement communities flourish in more than 50 towns across the country, but on-campus Austin Manor truly combines town and gown.

At that time the 150-room dormitory, which opened for women in 1923, faced demolition. But Warren asked college trustees if the university could turn Austin into one- and two-bedroom apartments.

He wanted it to mirror an apartment building in New Haven, Conn., that he had visited while a graduate student at Yale University. Residents included the elderly, young professionals and students.

"How are you, honey?" a gray-haired woman asked as Ohio Wesleyan University senior Carla Hoppe walked into the second-floor lounge of Austin Manor apartments on a sunny late-winter afternoon.

Hoppe, 22, smiled and knelt to talk to the elderly woman in a chair as she and her roommate, Raeven Rush, 21, of Parma, joined the daily social hour for residents of the nation's only intergenerational university housing.

For 20 years, students, retirees, professors and professionals have thrived in the former dormitory...now the Austin Manor.