I am exhausted! Too much toiling in the vineyards of scholarship, I guess. What this means is that you guys get scraps tonight. (Although this might not really be all that different from what I usually post.)
While looking for a picture of the original light fixtures outside Anderson Hall (a task at which I failed), I found this 1947 photo of the building’s construction:
Click on it to enlarge and you can clearly see that someone has dragged a bunch of tables and chairs onto the lawn in front of the building. I assume this was to give the workers a place to sit and eat or take breaks, because there wasn’t anything else on that part of campus yet. (Construction on Fondren Library wasn’t started until after this picture was taken.)
I’d never seen such a thing before. But I see it all the time now. Right this very minute these tables and chairs are stationed in roughly the same spot.
For those of you who don’t make it to campus a lot, these chairs are now everywhere. They first appeared a couple of years ago, I think, at the new pavilion behind the library, next to the fountains and under the trees. Quite European, really.
If you think this is exciting, just wait until I unleash my post about the light poles.