At the turn of the twentieth century, another way Harvard students maintained distinctions was based on residences. Wealthier students lived on the "Gold Coast," privately-owned residential halls on Mount Auburn Street that provided modern and more luxurious amenities compared to the old halls in the Yard. In 1913, Harvard began to buy these residences and absorb them into the university's residential system at the insistence of then president Abbott Lawrence Lowell who called the private dorms an "enemy to democracy." Yet President Lowell approved of efforts to purge Harvard of homosexuals, sought to decrease the admission of Jewish students, and disallowed black students from living in the freshman residences.