Ye gods.
Someone called my attention to this earlier this week and I’m still not over the shock. I’d never heard even a whisper of it before. I’ve been on the edge of tears three or four times over the last couple of days (mostly from happiness) but this was the only thing that made me want to weep from relief. Here’s what it was supposed to look like:
I mean, really? Really? I like nothing about this. Did you catch the fact that there are two basements? If you’ve ever been in the second basement of Sewall Hall you will understand why “dank” is the word that springs to mind.
Here’s the site plan. “Depressed Court” indeed:
So why didn’t they build it? Look at the date on this introductory page:
May 22, 1968 was ten days after George R. Brown’s 70th birthday, the moment when the age limitations he himself had advocated for kicked in and he resigned from the Rice Board of Trustees. When he went, the era of Rice’s rapid growth went with him. It’s hard to find much good that came from the events that followed, but at least we didn’t mess up our beautiful Chemistry Building.
Bonus:
