Rice History Corner

There was a very minor stir last week when an old laundry cart appeared next to the west door of Anderson Hall. Several emailers alerted me to it and another clever reader actually forwarded a picture to me, for which I am grateful. It’s indeed an unexpected treat:

The Tidelands, as most of you surely know, was a motel that sat on the corner of University and Main, where the BRC is today. Every newspaper story gives different dates, but my best guess as of this moment is that the opening was scheduled for the fall of 1958 but they put things into high gear and opened in time for the the Rice-Baylor game on November 30, 1957. Built by Spaw-Glass—run by Rice alums Louis Spaw (’40) and T. Franklin Glass (’39)—and Walter P. Moore and Associates (’27), it was always closely associated with Rice, especially after football star Dick Maegle (’55) became the manager in 1958.

I only saw the Tidelands in its last years so it came as a real surprise to learn that it was once quite a fancy place, its lounge a big draw for nightclubbers with acts such as Bob Newhart, the Smothers Brothers and–can this be true??–Willie Nelson. By the early 1980’s the glamour had worn off and the motel was acquired by Rice in the summer of 1983 as housing for grad students. This is what it was used for when I first saw it and the atmosphere was about as far from elegant as you could get. I’ll have more about this soon, but here’s a small appetizer:

Bonus:

This morning I was looking again at the pictures I put up on Monday of the construction site for Ryon Lab. I was, of course, thinking about the big parking lot out there and I couldn’t help but notice the strange zigzag pattern painted down the middle of it. I’m not sure I’ve ever seen anything like that and I wonder what it’s purpose was, if indeed it had any purpose. Zoom in and you can see it here in this photo:

I thought about this for a while, troubled by a niggling sense that maybe I had seen this zigzag somewhere after all. Ten minutes ago I figured it out. Here’s an image from a completely different collection—the papers of long time Civil Engineering professor and administrator Jim Sims (’41)—and there’s the zigzag:

It’s somewhat cryptically labeled “Civil Engineering Experiment” and dated 1959. A second picture makes it clear that this is the same parking lot as the one above:

I have no idea what this experiment is about but it seems to be lined up right behind the edge separating the construction site from the parking lot in the first photo.

I feel both oddly proud of myself and rather abashed that I’ve managed to hone such a peculiar expertise to so fine a point.

Bonus: Just for fun, here’s Jim Sims.

This picture was taken at the Rice Alumni Dinner in April of 1946. It’s noteworthy for a couple of reasons. First, it’s very, very early in William Houston’s Rice career–he must have been on campus for about fifteen minutes when this event took place. It’s also one of a very few photos I’ve seen of Harry Hanszen (he’s on the left) and the only image I’ve come across so far of Houston’s wife, Mildred (she’s on the right). Mrs. Houston was, it’s fair to say, a formidable woman, which certainly comes across here. (I have one great story about her that I found in a 1960 letter Alan Chapman wrote to Franz Brotzen (both long time professors in Mechanical Engineering). I’m not going to tell it here.) The young lady to the left is the Houston’s daughter, Anne, and the fellow in the middle is our old friend Carl Knapp (’16).

Just to give you some sense of the lay of the land at this moment, here’s an aerial shot of campus in 1946:

Things were about to start happening fast.

Bonus: Not bad, really, just misunderstood.

I idly opened up a box last week even though it was clearly labeled as containing negatives. Negatives are no fun whatsoever–the only way to really see what’s on one is to scan it–so I tend to avoid them whenever possible. I can’t explain why I suddenly opened this box. Predictably, it was full of fantastic images unlike any we have in the main photo files.

First up, Ryon Lab. This set was taken right after the demolition of what had been there before, the building called the Engineering Annex, which had itself evolved out of the original Chemistry Annex. Whoever took them had the presence of mind to walk all the way around the construction site so we can see what I’m really interested in (hint: it’s not construction).

There’s quite a bit to see here, including a great surface level view of that big parking lot, another obstructed view of the back of Chemistry and the Army and Navy ROTC buildings.

Bonus: Ever wonder where stuff like this comes from?

This image fills me with wistfulness. I will award one gold star to the first person who identifies the location.  (Grungy is not eligible.)

I had another in a long series of crazy days today and at the end of it I find that I’m not capable of saying anything worthwhile. So here’s roughly the same picture four times. Look and be amazed.

1916:

1921:

1950:

2012:

Bonus: Also from 2012.

After we heard the news last week of the death of John Graves (’42), the author of several lovely books including most famously Goodbye to A River, a reader emailed asking about a short piece Graves wrote in 1964. Published in the wonderful magazine Holiday, Graves’s piece, “Rice University: The Pangs of Change,” describes the ongoing transformation of his beloved alma mater. It is extremely interesting, so interesting in fact that I learned how to make a pdf file so I could show it to you. (I learned as I went, which you’ll be able to see because I didn’t have time to go back and make it perfect. It’s several pages and might take a minute to load but it’s worth it.)

John Graves Full Story

Coincidentally I also had a nice visit this week with Bill Broyles (’66), who has a warm remembrance of Graves up at the Texas Monthly website.

I went and picked up my own copy of Goodbye to A River and it came to me that I had bought it at a Friends of Fondren book sale several years ago. I paid five dollars for it, a bargain, and the name inscribed on the inside cover is “Demaris Hudspeth.”

My public has been clamoring for more posts about benches (seriously!) so we may as well start now. I occasionally hear it said that for years there were no benches allowed on campus. Sometimes the speculation is that this was to thwart romantic activities, sometimes that it was meant to thwart vagrants. Both seem quite plausible to me. There have been some benches around, though, for a significant amount of time. See here and here.

Oddly enough, these benches seem to have a tendency to move around. Here’s an example:

An undated photo that includes two benches across the road from George R. Brown, which aren’t there any more.

What became of them? I think they and some comrades headed over to Valhalla for a beer and never came back.

More later . . .

These pictures were in an old Hanszen College scrapbook that came in earlier this summer. Most of the stuff in it was identified, but not these two. Any thoughts?

I love this guy’s little smile:

This one looks more recent, but it’s not where the bike track is now:

As always, any help is appreciated!

Bonus: This comes from an observant reader. New tiles for the roof of Sewall. I watched them moving the stacks of tile into position–they threw them from man to man across the length of the roof. It was quite pretty.

The first time I went down in the steam tunnels, I was horrified. (By the way, I recently ran across some video of this excursion and it’s quite entertaining. Many thanks to my companions, both loyal readers!) I’m afraid the tunnels aren’t at all as glamorous as they sound. Dirty, dark, cobwebby, tight, full of pipes, in some places dripping with moisture–I shuddered a bit and wondered what else might be down there with us.

I didn’t expect this:

It was during Hell Week in 1956, which I believe was the last one.

Bonus: As long as we’re talking about master plans and deviations therefrom, here’s the first one: