Boston College Building and Campus Images 1880-2012 BC.1987.012 http://hdl.handle.net/2345/3218 Archives and Manuscripts Department John J. Burns Library Boston College 140 Commonwealth Avenue Chestnut Hill, MA, 02467 617-552-3282 [email protected] http://www.bc.edu/burns Table of Contents Summary Information ................................................................................................................................. 3 Administrative Information ......................................................................................................................... 4 Related Materials ........................................................................................................................................ 4 Historical Names of Boston College Buildings .......................................................................................... 4 Historical note ............................................................................................................................................. 6 Scope and Contents note ............................................................................................................................ 8 Arrangement note ........................................................................................................................................ 8 Collection Inventory .................................................................................................................................... 9 Series I: Individual buildings and structures ....................................................................................... 9 Series II: Multiple buildings .............................................................................................................. 97 Series III: Exteriors and landscapes ................................................................................................. 105 Series IV: Devlin Hall / Higgins Hall interiors ............................................................................... 107 Series V: Aerial views ..................................................................................................................... 110 Series VI: Bound volumes ............................................................................................................... 113 Boston College Building and Campus Images BC.1987.012 - Page 2 - Summary Information Library Unit Archives and Manuscripts Department Creator Boston College. Office of the President. Title Boston College building and campus images Date [inclusive] 1880-2012 Extent 29.0 Linear feet (29 boxes, 4 oversize folders) Language English Language of Materials note The primary language of this collection is English, with some items in Latin. Abstract The Boston College building and campus images collection is composed of photographs and images of Boston College buildings and campus. Building photographs include exterior and interior views of individual buildings; views of multiple buildings and campus in general; and aerial views of campus. Images include architectural renderings, drawings, and copy prints of building plans for new building construction as well as renovations for Gasson Hall and Bapst Library. Preferred Citation note Identification of item, Box number, Folder number, Boston College Building and Campus Images, BC.1987.012, John J. Burns Library, Boston College. Boston College Building and Campus Images BC.1987.012 - Page 3 - Administrative Information Publication Information Processed by Jessica Meyer, August 2013. This finding aid was produced using the Archivists' Toolkit. Restrictions on access Collection is open for research. Restrictions on use These materials are made available for use in research, teaching and private study, pursuant to U.S. Copyright Law. The user must assume full responsibility for any use of the materials, including but not limited to, infringement of copyright and publication rights of reproduced materials. Any materials used for academic research or otherwise should be fully credited with the source. The original authors may retain copyright to the materials. Provenance The majority of these materials were transferred by the President's office. A small number of photographs of buildings were transferred by the New England Province in 1986. Others were donated by Paul Nelligan, SJ, and the Holy Cross Archives and Special Collections in 2000. Related Materials Related Archival Materials note Boston College Alumni Photographs, BC.1990.056, John J. Burns Library, Boston College. Boston College Faculty and Staff Photographs, BC.2000.005, John J. Burns Library, Boston College. Boston College Special Guests and Events Photographs, BC.1986.032, John J. Burns Library, Boston College. Historical Names of Boston College Buildings Boston College Building and Campus Images BC.1987.012 - Page 4 - Alumni House: Putnam House British Catholic Authors Room, Bapst Library: Reception Room, Board of Trustees, Committee Room Chancellor's Office, Bapst Library: Librarian's Office, Director's Office Francis Thompson Room, Bapst Library: Faculty Room, Special Reading Room Gasson Hall: Recitation Hall, the Tower building Hillside Dormitories: Ignacio and Rubenstein Halls Irish Room, Gasson Hall: Assembly Hall, Gasson 100 Kresge Reading Room, Bapst Library: Old auditorium, Hall of Assembly Lonergan Center, Bapst Library: Browsing Room, Reference Room Newton Campus: site of former Newton College of the Sacred Heart O'Connell House: formerly the Liggett Estate Reading Room, Bapst Library: Periodical Room Boston College Building and Campus Images BC.1987.012 - Page 5 - Historical note In 1857 Rev. John McElroy, SJ, purchased land on Harrison Avenue, in Boston’s South End, with plans to establish a Catholic college on the site. In 1858, ground was broken for the construction of a church and a college building. The Church of the Immaculate Conception was constructed out of white New Hampshire granite and designed by architect Patrick C. Keely. The college building, designed by a Mr. Wissiben, was built of red brick. Adjacent land was later acquired, expanding the college’s presence in the area, and, in 1863, Boston College received its university charter. The 1870s saw an enlargement of the existing buildings and the opening of a new college hall. As Boston College expanded, it began to outgrow its original South End campus and a new location was sought. In 1907, land was purchased on the site of Lawrence farm in the village of Chestnut Hill on the border of Boston and Newton. A competition to design the new university campus was won by the firm Maginnis and Walsh who designed a campus master plan in the English Collegiate Gothic style. The first building to be erected was the centerpiece of the design: the Recitation, or Tower, building, now known as Gasson Hall. Named after Rev. Thomas Ignatius Gasson, SJ, President of Boston College between 1907 and 1914, Gasson Hall contains an ornate rotunda featuring a white marble statue of the Archangel Michael overcoming Lucifer. The building’s tower houses four bells named after prominent Jesuits. The second building to be completed on the Chestnut Hill campus was St Mary’s Hall. Between 1914 and 1917, the Jesuit faculty of Boston College had to commute from the original South End campus, which contained Jesuit lodgings, to the Chestnut Hill campus to teach. St Mary’s Hall was built to give the Jesuits residence facilities at the new campus and included living and dining arrangements and a chapel. The construction of St Mary’s was followed by Devlin Hall and the Bapst Library in the 1920s. Devlin Hall was constructed between 1921 and 1924 to house the expanding science departments. Later on, as the science departments expanded even further, the Physics and Biology departments moved into Higgins Hall, constructed for that purpose in 1965. Later still, in 1991, the Chemistry Department moved to the state-of-the-art Merkert Center on Beacon Street. The Bapst Library still inhabits its original Maginnis and Walsh designed building on Middle Campus. After extensive renovation in the 1980s, it now shares the building with the Burns Library, a research and archival facility. The campus continued to grow throughout the twentieth century, both through new construction and through the acquisition of adjacent property. One such addition was O’Connell House, built at the turn of the twentieth century on the estate of the former drugstore baron Louis K. Liggett. The building and its surrounding land were later donated to Cardinal O’Connell, who used the house as a residence. After his death, the Church donated O’Connell House to Boston College, where it has been used as, variously, a Jesuit residence, a football dorm, the base for the nascent School of Management, and, since 1972, as the home of the student union. Other important additions to the Chestnut Hill campus include O’Neill Library, designed by Walter Gropius’s firm, the Architects Collaborative, and opened in 1981; and the Robsham Theater Arts Center, also opened in 1981, which contains a main auditorium that seats 600, as well as smaller theaters and Boston College Building and Campus Images BC.1987.012 - Page 6 - classroom space. The early twenty-first century has seen further large-scale construction in the form of Stokes Hall, an 183,000 square foot building that opened in 2013 to house the humanities departments. Boston College In-town A Boston College downtown center was opened at 11 Beacon Street, in the center