Friday, November 10, 1961 University Daily Kansan
Page 13
Changeable 'Shack'—
(Continued from page 1)
location of the women's dormitory area at 11th and Louisiana. University Hall—now Fraser—was the only other building on Mt. Oread.
The enrollment had risen to 582, and many departments were in need of additional space. This was especially true of the chemistry department, which was crowded into an area of the Fraser Hall basement. To make the situation worse, the chemical odors frequently escaped into the upper stories of the building.
IN 1880 THE STATE LEGISLATURE appropriated $4,000 and granted permission to use an unexpended interest fund of $8,000 for a new chemistry building. The following year, the chemistry department moved its equipment and odors into its new home.
Within five years, however, the chemistry department and the pharmacy department. which shared the building, needed more room. To create additional space, a new basement was excavated.
THIS DIDN'T HELP MUCH, for as Chancellor Snow told,the legislature one year, the basement was so damp the instructors "frequently suffered from malarial attacks on account of their unfavorable location."
In 1900 the long-awaited chemistry building—now Bailey Hall—was completed, and the chemists left "The Shack" to the medics. The damp basement became a place where, according to a student writer several years later, "medical students carved on 'stiffs' in semigloom; and the existence the basement led was deadly dull."
The attic became an animal house for raising rats and other rodents used in laboratory and experimental work, and once again the building had its distinctive odors. When the medics departed several years later, a student journalist wrote that the enduring problem was to "eradicate the rodent odors from the attic."
By 1911, a newly-formed department—journalism—needed additional space. The University Kansan had resumed publication in 1904 after a suspension of several years, and in 1908 it had become a tri-weekly. The enrollment in journalism courses was increasing rapidly, and the printing department was crowded into a small area in the basement of Fraser Hall.
THE MEDICS DEPARTED IN 1911 AND THE JOURNALISTS moved in. Writing of the move several years later, a student said:
"A good job of house cleaning and airing naturally followed . . .
and the basement turned from decomposing to composing."
With adequate space, a home of their own, and status as a department, the journalists were ready for bigger things. On January 16, 1912, the University Kansan became a daily paper.
FOR THE NEXT FORTY YEARS, the story of "The Shack"—as it was named by the journalism students—is the story of the UDK and the journalism department. The UDK "extras," the special editions, the crusades for campus improvements, and the day-by-day news came from "The Shack."
Many men and women now prominent in journalism gained their first journalistic experience in "The Shack." Some of them are Ben Hibbs, editor of the Saturday Evening Post; James A. Bell, foreign correspondent for Time Magazine; Doris Fleeson, Washington correspondent for United Features Syndicate; Lester Suller, vice president of Look Magazine and Roy Roberts, president of the Kansas City Star.
Presently in Kansas journalism are such graduates as Elton Carter. Norton Daily Telegram; John Conard, Kiowa County Signal; Eugene Lowther, Emporia Gazette; Clyde M. Reed Jr., Parsons Sun; Dolph Simons, Lawrence Journal-World; Oscar Stauffer, Stauffer Publications, Topeka; Ralph Hemenway, Minneapolis Messenger; Robert Bolitho, Harper Advocate and Otto Epp, Greeley County Republican.
While in "The Shack," the journalism department experienced its "golden age," when over 200 students were enrolled in journalism courses one year. The new printing equipment and newsroom equipment needed made additional space necessary.
Better working conditions also were needed. The newsroom was poorly lighted, and uncovered steam pipes in the lecture rooms popped and banged when they filled with steam, furnishing competition—along with the printing press—to the instructors.
By the mid-1930s, journalism faculty members began to talk of moving the department to the Fowler Shops building when a proposed new shops building would be constructed. In 1942, Elmer Beth, professor of journalism, began tentative plans for remodelling Fowler Shops into a new home for the journalism department.
THREE YEARS LATER. the floor plans were completed by Prof. Beth, revised somewhat by the department staff, and submitted. Blue prints were on display in the newsroom by the summer of 1945.
The legislature appropriated $150,000 in 1945 and another $150,000 in 1947 for the Fowler Schopes project.
MEANWHILE. THE JOURNALISM department reached two milestones. In 1944, the Board of Regents announced it was raising the department to the status of a School, and in 1948 the William Allen White School of Journalism became one of the 35 accredited journalism schools in the United States.
The long-awaited move into the remodeled Fowler Shops—renamed Flint Hall—came in February, 1952, and "The Shack" once again settled into its former tranquil atmosphere. For several years it was used for extension classes and the theater workshop, and in 1956 its final residents, the anatomy students, moved in.
"The Shack's" death warrant was issued last year when the legislature appropriated $1,800,000 for two new additions to Watson Library. One of these additions will extend east from the present structure and cover the area now occupied by "The Shack."
By next spring, that little anonymous building which has housed students in chemistry, medicine, journalism, and anatomy, will no longer exist.
ONLY VISITORS—"The Shack," second oldest building on campus, has housed many departments.
Engineering and Physical Science Seniors
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Bell System representatives will be on campus November 14 and 15. Sign up for an interview at the engineering office.
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