Science Hall – SUI’s Only Mobile Home.

Science Hall, known as well as the Geology Building, is a three-story red-brick building, 114 by 74 feet, and was built in 1884 for the purpose of housing the sciences. The original cost of the structure was around $50,000. To make room for the new Hall of Natural Science – Macbride Hall – Science Hall was moved during the summer of 1905, inch by inch over a distance of 200 feet to its present location on the corner of Capital and Jefferson Streets. Today, Calvin Hall, as it is now known, stands as the sole surviving relic of the Red Brick Campus that once was.

Location: The Science Hall is unique to the University campus by having two different locations! When first built in 1884, it was located north and east of Old Capitol and North Hall, on what was, at that time, called University Square. At this location (1884-1905) Science Hall, like Old Capitol, faced east. But in its new location at 5 West Jefferson Street, Calvin Hall was rotated 90 degrees to the south, making the front entrance face southward!

As we’ve discussed in earlier posts, the State University of Iowa, in the latter part of the 19th century, badly needed additional facilities to accommodate the expanding needs of a growing University. In 1881, the State Board of Regents approved an $80,000 appropriation for the construction of two new buildings on campus. By 1882, the new Medical Building became the first of those two new facilities.

In this 1883 publication, we find the beginnings of The Red Brick Campus – 1. Old Capitol 2. South Hall 3. North Hall 4. Observatory #1 5. Mechanics Academy (Hospital) 6. Homeopathic Medicine #1 7. Armory/Power Plant 8. Medical Building.

In 1883, the Board further defined that second building by approving an additional funding of $45,000 for a science building – “one new building for the better accommodations of said University in the school of Science” – and $5,600 for “steam heating, plumbing and gas fitting in said building.” R. S. Finkbine of Des Moines was employed as architect to draw up plans and specifications, for which he received payment of $700. Opening of bids occurred on June 20, 1884 and Sheets and Company of Iowa City won the contract at a bid of $39,955.

The Science Building opened for classes in 1885. The first floor contained the Geology Department – headed by Samuel Calvin, the second floor hosted the Biology Department – directed by Thomas Macbride, and the third floor housed the Museum of Natural History.

The Burlington Hawkeye, on February 7, 1886, devoted its entire issue to SUI and made the following remarks in regard to Science Hall, which it had, prior to its opening, designated as “the deserted palace.”

Its design shows care and forethought, directed to a practical purpose, and its workmanship and materials are excellent. Taken as a whole, within and without, it is neat, substantial and convenient, and presents the nearest approach to elegance to be found in any of the University buildings; yet it every where bears evidence of having been constructed with an eye to economy.

Over the next decade, the SUI Board was frequently confronted with trivial matters in regard to keeping the University buildings equipped. Thomas H. Macbride – at that time a professor of botany – wrote the following message to Secretary William J. Haddock – dated August 22, 1891…

We need five window curtains for windows on the second floor of the science building. The material is not expensive, and I believe the entire cost will fall within ten dollars. What can you do for us?

Again in 1894, Macbride, Samuel Calvin, C. C. Nutting, B. Shimek and Gilbert Houser, all of the faculty of the Science Department, together made the following plea to Secretary Haddock:

The engine in the basement of the science building is to us the source of unceasing annoyance. During the time it is in motion, no work with the finer microscopes can be done on the second floor and none with any microscope on the third. Besides, the soot and dirt from the engine-room and sometimes the smoke permeates the whole house and makes it impossible to keep our collections clean. In addition to this, our valuable collections are constantly endangered by the shops in the basement. It is needless to say that our collections are in many ways unique and could not be replaced.

**Science Hall (right) with North Hall (far left) was joined with the new Dental Building (middle) in 1894 – all three buildings were tucked just north of Old Capitol on University Square.**

All the while, the University kept growing and the Board of Regents was becoming less and less effective in putting together long-range plans while being consumed with smaller, day-to-day needs. In the process, the University failed to have any long-range facility plan, leaving the central campus looking more like a checkerboard of eclectic red-bricked buildings.

In October 1897, President Charles A. Schaeffer (1887-1898) addressed these on-going facility issues by announcing a competition for designing a new Hall of Liberal Arts – one that would set a new precedent in architecture and style. The Board hired as judge Henry Van Brundt of Kansas City, one of the architects of the 1893 Chicago World’s Fair. Van Brundt chose a scheme in the grand style of the Chicago exhibition and recommended that the new building be built on the southeast quadrant of University Square – with construction beginning in 1898.

In 1900, new University president – George MacLean (1899-1911) – picked up on Schaeffer’s ideas and proposed a dramatic ‘New University‘ plan to eliminate all of the existing buildings surrounding Old Capitol, replacing them with three fine buildings similar in size and style to the new Liberal Arts Building. To say the least, MacLean’s plan was quite controversial, but as fate had it, the massive fire on March 10, 1901 that destroyed both South Hall and the Medicine Building brought an immediate urgency to the President’s ‘New University’ proposal, and the long road to today’s Pentacrest had begun!

**1904 – Laying the cornerstone for the new Hall of Natural Science – MacBride Hall – with Science Hall looking on.**

MacLean’s first step in instituting his ‘New University’ plan was to begin construction of a Hall of Natural Science in 1904 on the northeast corner of University Square – adjacent to the Hall of Liberal Arts (Schaeffer Hall) which had opened in 1902. While the idea of new stately stone buildings replacing a hodge-podge of old, worn out fire-traps on campus was met with excitement, the reality for a new Natural Science building meant that the University’s most recent facility, Science Hall (1884), would need to be razed!

As one might imagine, the public outcry was immediate, with the loudest dissenters being the staff of the Science Department, with Professors Samuel Calvin, Thomas H. Macbride, and Charles C. Nutting – a trio later called ‘The Great Triumvirate” – taking the lead by proposing, what would become, the greatest engineering wonder in the history of the State of Iowa –

Move Science Hall, which weighs 6,000 tons, from its present location on University Square, 200 feet to the north and west, crossing Jefferson and Capitol Streets, turning it 90 degrees to the south, and then resettle it on its new foundation; all while University classes continue to meet in the building!

**Iowa City historian, Irving Weber, tells the story this way…**

Some critics (of the plan) said they might as well try moving Old Capitol to the moon; others said it was a plot to assure the building would be torn down after all. But MacBride, Calvin, and Nutting, ignored the critics and found a Chicago firm, L.P. Friestedt and Co., who said it could be done with screw-jacks.

**Weber continues** – In April 1905, a crew of skilled men came from Chicago. Following them, also on the Rock Island Railroad, were 800 jack-screws, 675 6-inch rollers (4 feet long) and 27 carloads of wooden timbers to be used as cribbing under the building as it was moved. The job took from April into August 1905, moving at a pace of two feet per day, and all of Iowa City and the University served as sidewalk superintendents. *And, all the while, not a single Science class had to be dismissed, not a test tube was upset, nor one crack in the building develop!*

**In the November 1905 edition of the Iowa Alumnus, we find this interesting tidbit…**

One of the most interesting features of the movement was that of turning the building on its axis as it moved forward. In order to pass another building – Dental Building – a one-eighth turn was necessary, and a back turn necessary in order to bring the building over the new foundation. The turning movement was accomplished by ‘cutting’ the rollers, and the adjustment of the rollers was so nicely done that the double movement landed the building almost exactly on the required spot.

Before and after pics – (left) 1904 on University Square – (right) 1905 on Jefferson Street.

***MacBride Hall*** *where Science Hall once stood.*

As we mentioned above, Science Hall was moved off University Square in the summer of 1905 to make way for the new Natural Science Building – later named Macbride Hall – the second building of the four classics surrounding Old Capitol in today’s Pentacrest.

(P-0173) The “Old Hall” of Natural Science in its new location became Calvin Hall in 1964.

After moving into its new location in 1905, Science Hall became known as Geology Hall. In 1964, the building was renamed for Samuel Calvin in remembrance of the distinguished faculty member who taught at the University – 1873 to 1911 – a world-renowned geologist and curator of the Museum of Natural History. Today, Calvin Hall contains a variety of student services offices, and a boulder beneath the south facade commemorates the 1855 decision to admit women to SUI on the same basis as men – the first state university to do so!

A major factor behind the decision to move Science Hall was its Italiante red-brick exterior, which, in President MacLain’s ‘New University’ plan of 1900, was out of sync with the buildings planned for University Square (Pentacrest). As the SUI administration progressed with MacLain’s plan for a limestone Beaux-Arts Classicism theme for the buildings surrounding Old Capitol, thank goodness for men like Samuel Calvin, Thomas Macbride and C.C. Nutting, who recognized the great worth of Science Hall, expending the resources needed to save this classic structure from the wrecking ball. Today, Calvin Hall – this red-brick building sitting high atop Jefferson Street – is the oldest surviving university building, excepting Old Capitol, and the best example of the many buildings that once populated the SUI campus – the sole surviving relic of the SUI Red Brick Campus that once was.