Repository: UIHistories Project: Book - Overview and State of the University (1913) [PAGE 31]

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in extension of Wright street on the west and Mathews avenue on the east have been or are being opened. All lands in the quadrangle bounded by these several roads and University Hall, and all the lands extending out to the Forestry, are to be cleared of the small buildings, and of fruit trees, and of growing crops, and put into lawn except eight small plats east of the Observatory which the Experiment Station people think imperative t o t h e i r work for some time yet. flu other words, a great expanse of the most beautiful landscape in Illinois is to be put into the campus, improved from time to time, dedicated to the human interests, and given over to the outdoor life of the University. W e are exceedingly fortunate in our land holdings, and are going to make the most of the fact. It is doubtful if any other American university has such a beautiful campus, or such an outlook for a still more beautiful and impressive one. Now as to the possible or probable steps which have not yet been decided upon. A serious and pressing need is an Assembly Hall capable of seating three thousand people. In plan it seems to me that it should be something between an opera house and a church, with something of the comfort of the former, and something of the dignity and stateliness of the latter. It should have a capacious platform: it might well house the School of Music; and it should have the finest pipe organ in the region. T h e Library Building will at an early day be required for the exclusive use of the Library and Library School. The time is not remote when the stacks will not only need to be enlarged by taking in the room overhead occupied by the school, which has always been the intention, but when the wing of the building containing the stacks will have to be extended to the south for the accommodation of the larger libraries which we are going to have. Moreover, the administrative offices need better accommodations. These things will lead to an Administration Building. The department of physics is in the Engineering Building only as a matter of convenience, and beeause that is the best place we have had for it. It does not belong there, it requires special accommodations, and the engineering work needs the space. This means a new Physics Laboratory and natural accessories. The Coliegi of Science n e r d s a substantial addition to its present buildin , or a separate structure for housing its eollec tions, and perhaps propagating materials tor its work. It is a DC 1 which is likely lo time t<> be realized. It is a somewhat Common thought that Universit) Hall, or, a