Tag Archives: West Hall

Seven Oaks opens in its East Lake Road location (p. 323)

Posted on June 21, 2012 by | Comments Off on Seven Oaks opens in its East Lake Road location (p. 323)

East and West Halls, had been completely renovated in 1954.) The library, designated the Everett Needham Case Library in 1962, was dedicated in 1959. As far back as 1931, Charles W. Spencer had stressed the need for a new building but it was his successor, Thomas M. Iiams, who was to have a major role in planning the structure and to see it take shape. The architect was Robert B. O’Connor (D.F.A., ’59) of O’Connor and Kilham. Chapel House, an anonymous gift, was designed by Skidmore, Owings, and Merrill and completed in 1959. It has a chapel for meditation and prayer, a library, a music room, and facilities for a small number of interfaith resident guests. The Athletic Center, honoring William A. Reid, ’18, Director of the Division of Physical Education and Ath1etics (1935-1955), was opened in 1959, also; its architect was Oscar F. Wiggins, ’22. Watson House, a home for the President, given by Mrs. Thomas J. Watson, Sr., in honor of her late husband, was ready for occupancy at the time of Mr. Case’s retirement in 1962. Arthur A. Meggett, ’36, designed the building; its completion made the president’s former residence, Merrill House, available for the Faculty Club.

Two other facilities should be mentioned. The first, the Colgate Camp on Upper Saranac Lake, was the gift of S. Bayard Colgate (LL.D., 1958), a Trustee, and his family in 1953. It is well suited for use of the Outing Club and for faculty conferences and summer recreation. The second is the new Seven Oaks golf course in the valley east of the campus and the village which was opened in 1958 to supersede the old course behind the dormitories.

As early as 1941 the American Association of University Professors Chapter began a survey of the curriculum and University organization. In the spring of 1943, at Mr. Case’s suggestion, a committee on the Post-War College was established from the faculty with the President as Chairman, to continue the study with particular reference to the needs of a world at peace. Its far-ranging report received searching faculty analysis and was adopted, part by part, from 1945 to 1947.

Central to the program was the general education Core Curriculum, made up of a series of courses prescribed for all students. This concept was an outgrowth of experience with the five one-semester survey courses in the Biological Science, Physical Sciences, Social Sciences, Philosophy and Religion for freshmen and a course in Fine Arts for sophomores, which were an important feature of the “Colgate Plan of

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Posted in Chapter 15, p. 323, The Case Administration 1942-1962, timeline

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Memorial Chapel (p. 268)

Posted on June 14, 2012 by | Comments Off on Memorial Chapel (p. 268)

be well-organized appeals in the form of the annual alumni fund.

The early years of the Bryan administration saw renovation and adaptation of four old buildings. Work on the dormitories, West, and East Halls, which Dr. Merrill had planned and to which the growing enrollment of the College gave urgency, was completed-West in 1910 and East, with a Commons for feeding 100 in the basement, a year later. At the termination of Colgate Academy in 1912, its facilities became available for other uses. Administrative offices were moved from the Library to the academy building, henceforth known as the Administration Building, and Taylor Hall, which the Academy fraternities had occupied, was taken over for the post office and the YMCA.

The long recognized need for an infirmary was met in 1913 through the generosity of Mrs. James C. Colgate whose contributions enabled the University to acquire and equip the former Phi Kappa Psi fraternity house on East Pleasant Street for this purpose,

Though the College, Seminary, and Academy each had its own chapel, the College chapel had become so crowded by 1915 that only a part of the student body could be accommodated. Plans for a new building were drawn by Harding and Seaver, architects of Pittsfield, Massachusetts, and a location chosen which would bring buildings together around the north quadrangle. The donor, Miss Mary Colgate, sister of James C. Colgate, who gave it in memory of their father, James B. Colgate, specified that it should be in the simple New England meeting house style. Construction began in the spring of 1917 and it was first used for the September 1918 convocation. Miss Colgate dedicated the building in June, 1920, and provided an endowment for its maintenance. Its symmetry and simple classical beauty have made a focal point on the Hill ever since.

By the early 1920’s the campus had grown into the park-like tract that its planners and creators, especially the landscape architect Ernest W. Bowditch, and Superintendent of Buildings and Grounds, James M. Taylor, had envisioned. The former died in 1918 and Dr. Taylor resigned two years later to be succeeded by Lt. Colonel James Ballantine, who had recently come to Colgate as Director of Military Instruction. Colgate’s buildings and grounds by 1922 had an estimated value of $1,100,000.

Though the size of the faculty had increased from 36 in 1908 to 48 in 1922 these figures are misleading since the first includes ,21 for the

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Posted in Chapter 13, p. 268, The Bryan Period 1908-1922, timeline

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Lathrop Hall completed (p. 250)

Posted on June 14, 2012 by | Comments Off on Lathrop Hall completed (p. 250)
Lathrop Hall, A1000-51, Folder10, p250

Within minutes of the Lathrop Hall dedication Dr. Lawrence, President of the Trustees, laid the cornerstone of an addition to the Chemistry Building-a unique juxtaposition of events in Colgate’s history of building construction. This project, too, came from Dr. Merrill’s initiative. When Lathrop Hall had been assured in 1905 he had appealed at once to Andrew Carnegie for funds and, after extended consideration, $20,000 was granted, provided a like sum be raised for endowment for the Chemistry Department. This condition was soon met and the architects, Harding and Seaver, and the contractors for Lathrop Hall given orders to proceed with plans and construction. The three large laboratories, lecture room and other facilities were in use by the following autumn.

During his first months on the campus the President discovered that the dormitories, East and West Halls, had fallen into serious dilapidation. With the requirements of the science departments satisfied and with increased college enrollment pressing for student accommodations, he made plans for their renovation. The only tangible result, however, was the equipping of a lounging room on the first floor of West Hall which faculty wives opened in December 1905 with a tea for students and professors. More extensive remodeling would come with the next administration.

The last major building project of the Merrill administration was the central heating plant which represented a significant advance in efficient maintenance and comfort. The financial assistance of the Baptist

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Posted in Chapter 12, p. 250, The Merrill Presidency, 1899-1908, timeline

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p. 33 – Administration, setting and staff, 1820-1833

Posted on May 1, 2012 by | Comments Off on p. 33 – Administration, setting and staff, 1820-1833

Besides the chapel, West Hall contained a lecture room, a library, and studies and sleeping rooms which could accommodate about seventy students, two to the room. Occupants were permitted to paint the walls of their rooms if they wished and furniture from the “stone building on the plain,” which groups and individuals had provided, was transferred to chambers in the new building bearing the names the donors had specified for those in the old one. Since lack of furniture made it possible at first to use less than half of the sleeping rooms, appeals went out for contributions of beds, bedding and other equipment. Outfitting quarters for students cost $50.00.

Extensive renovations have obliterated all traces of the original interior but externally the building is the same as it was in 1827. One observer then wrote that the structure was plain, well designed and constructed, and showed marks of strict economy. Today architects still comment on its simplicity and excellent proportions. In the general exterior design it resembles other college buildings of the period including Painter Hall at Middlebury, Hascall’s Alma Mater.*

Within a week after West Hall was dedicated, Hascall had completed, at a cost of $950, a “large convenient” boarding house, known as the “Cottage Edifice,” and a wood house; both were, of course, necessary complements to the new classroom and dormitory building. The boarding house, which stood between West and the present Alumni Halls, was 48 feet long and 34 feet wide and two stories high. The cellar and kitchen were in the first story, the dining room and living quarters for the steward and his family in the second.

The campus of the 1820’s and 30’s probably was bleak, bare of trees or shrubs, and without landscaping to enhance the natural beauty of the site. A new road down to the present College Street was opened and about ten acres to the north stretching to that highway were purchased. Hascall, acting as superintendent of buildings and grounds, cleared the space around the buildings and enclosed it with a fence. He also removed to the rear of the boarding house an old distillery, presumably once operated by Samuel Payne, for the students to use as a workshop. By 1829 Kendrick could report that the Education Society owned real estate worth over $12,000.

Hascall, Kendrick, and other faculty members to a lesser degree,

* The Trustees of the Hamilton Academy purchased the “building on the plain” for their boys’ department which occupied it until the academy was discontinued in the 1850’s. Hamilton Academy Record Book, Apr. 28, 1827.

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p. 29 – Administration, setting, and staff, 1820-1833

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Mrs. Samuel Payne, A0999-3, p29

Deacon Payne seems to have acquired a moderate amount of wealth in agriculture. He took a rather active part in the political life of the county and twice sat in the State Assembly. He belonged to the conservative wing of the Democratic-Republican party and, his solid figure and dignified presence must have been well known at caucuses and conventions. For many years he ‘was a Justice of the Peace and in 1832 a Presidential Elector. Mrs. Payne, a kind and pious woman, who made her home a place where the young men of the Institution could find understanding and cheer, was known as “the Students’ Mother.” In the early years before rooms were available in the “building on the plain,” students lived with the Paynes. Without children of their own, they gave to the school the love and affection they would normally have bestowed on a family.

The choice of a site for the new building, now to be on the Payne farm, the Executive Committee referred to a committee of six. Hascall, whose plan for the structure they had already approved, served as a member. He had represented the Institution at a meeting of the Board of the now auxiliary New York Baptist Theological Seminary in New York City whose members raised $2,000 by their own efforts for the building and later, when additional funds were needed, borrowed $1,000 more at 7 percent interest.

A gift of $1,000 from Nicholas Brown proved another important addition to the building fund. Brown’s pastor, the Rev. Stephen Gano of the First Baptist Church of Providence, Rhode Island, returned from a visit to Hamilton in 1825 enthusiastic about the Seminary and

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First building erected (p. 26)

Posted on May 1, 2012 by | Comments Off on First building erected (p. 26)
The First Building c. 1823, A1000-24, Folder 1, p26
Engraving of the first Colgate building, c. 1823

a brick building worth $3,500. By November 1822 they had more than fulfilled their contract. The building was made of stone instead of bricks and its dimensions, 36 feet by 64 feet, were in excess of specifications. It had cost $32.72 more than had been agreed upon and was ready six months earlier than promised. Daniel Hascall had taken the lead in enlisting the support of the villagers, particularly the members of the Baptist Church, and had supervised the construction. His personal finances became so involved in those of the project that a decade later he was in debt over $1,100 and never was fully reimbursed for the sums he had advanced. When the Seminary vacated the brick building the Hamilton Academy used the entire structure until a fire destroyed it in 1855.

The new building, later known as the “building on the plain” or the “stone academy,” stood on the east side of the present Hamilton Street and was dedicated at the Education Society’s annual meeting in June, 1823. A crude woodcut shows the three-story building to have been simple, unpretentious, and similar to remaining examples of the architecture of the period in this locality, such as East and West Halls. Hascall, by direction of the Executive Committee, had the yard

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Posted in Administration Setting and Staff 1820-1833, Chapter 2, p. 26, timeline

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