Repository: UIHistories Project: Dedication - Foellinger Auditorium [PAGE 10]

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i f hoveiftoer"4 and 5 of 1907, the Though failing to realize the full scaled-down facility was dedicated scope of the architect's concept, with an inaugural ceremony and a the Auditorium was still an imprestwo-day series of concerts. The sive achievement. During the dediprogram featured the work of com- cation ceremony. University poser Edward Alexander MacDowell, President Edmund J. James said whose piano music helped establish of i t an independent American musical "Thousands of students may style. During those concerts, a gather here where now there are major acoustical problem was only hundreds. The taste of a growdetected. Aflawin the building's ing and refining people may demand construction caused a now legendary areconstructionof many of our echo, which reverberated through- buildings. Certainly another and out the building and up into the larger hall will be demanded for dome. Remodeling efforts in 1915 many common purposes: but I and 1937 sought to solve the acous- cannot conceive of a time when tical honors and achieved some the simple and noble lines of this success. ructure will ever cease to be a slight to our si