Battle brews over demolition plan
After 105 years on WashingtonUniversity's historic Hilltop Campus, storied Prince Hall is slated to be torn down.
The former dormitory will be replaced by an underground garage with about 500 spaces and a new university center.
WashingtonUniversity's plan to demolish the building, which is part of a National Historic Landmark District, has ignited opposition from preservationists.
The Hilltop Campus Historic District was listed in the National Register of Historic Places in 1979 and designated a National Historic Landmark in 1987. The outcry against demolition has been led by the St. Louis County Historic Buildings Commission and the National Trust for Historic Preservation.
In a letter to university Chancellor Mark Wrighton, Jane Gleason, who heads St. Louis County's Historic Buildings Commission, wrote, "This would be an act of vandalism on a national scale that would damage the reputation not just of the university but of the whole region."
The university has invested considerably more than $50 million in recent times to restore and refurbish various buildings on the Hilltop Campus.
M. Fredric Volkmann, vice chancellor for public affairs, said, "Our efforts have been highly successful, with one significant exception - Prince Hall."
The effort to save Prince Hall has been led by Esley Hamilton, historian for St. LouisCounty's Department of Parks and Recreation. Hamilton says the Hilltop Campus buildings are probably the largest surviving group of buildings from any world's fair. They are also prime examples of the architectural work of Cope & Stewardson and helped to define the Collegiate Gothic style, he said.
The buildings are modeled after those at Oxford and Cambridge in England but made of Missouri red granite with Bedford limestone trim.
Prince Hall began as Liggett Hall and was used first as housing for public school administrators attending the World's Fair of 1904. WashingtonUniversity used it as a dormitory into the late 1950s. For the last 20 years, it has been used for administrative and student organization offices and classrooms.
Volkmann said the university tried for years to find appropriate uses for Prince Hall. Its tiny rooms, multi-level floors and unwieldy design make it ill-equipped for use for a university center, classrooms or a modern dormitory, he said.
The university plans to start building the garage this summer and the university center in about two years. It also plans a new building for law and social science students to be built on existing surface parking lots; the spaces will be replaced by the new parking garage, Volkmann said.
The new university center would be built in Collegiate Gothic architectural style - the same as the original building, Volkmann said. The design would "respect and honor the work and vision of the campus' first architects."
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