The Wake

The Science Classroom Building (or SciCB) has long been referred to as a “public eyesore” and “Cold War relic”—some have even gone as far as to call it the “ugliest building in the English-speaking world” (if not the entire universe)—but it also happened to be one of my favorite buildings on campus. Here was a structure that was built to great fanfare in 1964 and now, 44 years after the fact, is being torn down to even greater applause from students and university administrators to our local and state governments alike. What began in earnest so many decades ago as a “phase I of II” construction project never saw completion and quickly came to be viewed as a “temporary building” in the hearts and minds of university stakeholders from all different walks of life.

What you may not know is that this particular parcel of land was once home to the University of Minnesota’s School of Mineralogy and Mines, comprised of three other “temporary buildings”—all built in the year 1947, and surviving until work on SciCB had begun in 1963. In fact, there were once 16 such temporary buildings in use on the Minneapolis campus. 222 Pleasant St. SE—the Classroom Building’s physical address—was also the proposed location for the Hubert H. Humphrey Institute, according to a 1977 Minnesota Daily article (compliments of the University Archives). But an idea that would have involved a complicated “stacking” of the institute atop the six completed, below-ground floors of the Science Classroom Building—the top-floor boardwalk, bathroom and vending area were really considered to be more of an afterthought (a bridge between phases I and II, if you will)­—was ultimately scrapped in favor of using the more pristine and unadulterated West Bank location. Though it was highly visible, very little was ever done to this buildings unforgiving façade in all 44 years of its existence: the rebar was bent up in select areas and, it appears, the last of the construction workers absented the job site on that very same day.

Flash-forward to the year 1994 and enter Professor of Geology and Geophysics Kent C. Kirkby. While he didn’t lecture there right away, Kirkby has taught about 20 sessions in the Science Classroom Building. His stories are numerous,and I couldn’t possibly relate all of them here, but I will tell you some of the most remarkable. As a former Geology 1001 student under Kirkby’s instruction—in the Science Classroom Building, no less—it is almost my duty to do so.

We are very lucky, I have learned, to have had the lecture chairs in that building arranged in as pleasing a fashion as they were—for it was not always that way. Kirkby tells me that when he started, there were no aisles to speak of, save for the ones naturally created between wall and row at both ends of the room, with very little clearance given between the rows of chairs themselves. An old SciCB classroom seating chart would therefore have resembled a very predictable pattern: when students arrived late, as they invariably did, there would be a run on the edge seats, where the punctual and the overly-punctual had already set up their camps, leaving the centers of rows completely empty and hordes of people standing in the fringes all during lecture. To fix this problem, an instructor literally had to master the ability of telling his or her students to “squeeze to the center,” several minutes after the official start time of class—an obvious annoyance, and a real distraction from the processes of learning and its forerunner, concentration. Thankfully, the Office of Space Management (OSM) saw this as a real concern as well, and remodeled the lecture halls to the way they were just before demolition—I’m even told they used substantially more comfortable chairs, with greater aisle spaces, to further remove any obstacles to learning.

I couldn’t resist asking Kirkby’s opinion on the quote, generally attributed to University President Bob Bruininks, saying that the Science Classroom Building was “…the ugliest building in the English-speaking world.” He felt SciCB had “a lot of competition for being the ugliest,” but suggested that perhaps it was in the running for being one of the most poorly designed buildings in the world. I wonder how this makes the late head SciCB architect John Rauma feel, or if he understood the madness when he designed the thing.

Kirkby assures me that the Science Classroom Building was “not designed to be handicap-accessible in the slightest,” as there was but one suitable elevator and—as those of us who have taken classes in that building will note—a maze of doors and half-flights of stairs, all for getting in and out of four different lecture halls scattered about the complex. In fact, there is a very interesting story about how, one day, early in his teaching career, Kent Kirkby wanted to bring sodas for his entire class (located, naturally, in the sub-sub-sub-basement portion of the building), and, having never planned his route with an elevator before, was forced to crawl underneath a stairwell with a dolly of sodas because the hallway/janitors’ closet that served as the entrance to “175” for persons with disabilities had been locked by mistake!

When asked if he would miss the building, not surprisingly, Kirkby’s reply was more along the lines of “[I] won’t say I’m sad to see it go.” Though they have quite a history together, Professor Kirkby has always thought of SciCB as somewhat of a “problem child.” He added to this, saying: “After a while you just learned to put up with its idiosyncrasies”—a novel concept in a society whose bromide too often tends to be “if it don’t work, rebuild it.”

Neither Kirkby nor I have put up much of an effort to “Save SciCB,” for we are both pretty much in agreement that it’s time for it to go. While the Professor wants to see new classrooms (with windows this time!) that are mindful of prevailing trends in “classroom seating economics,” I am happy to imagine a better, faster and stronger, amalgamated student services station. Our Science Teaching and Student Services (ST+SS) building—the newest tenant of 222 Pleasant St SE—should finally put an end to the turbulent history of temporary fixtures on this piece of property, and, at an estimated price tag of $72.5 million (including demolition costs), it is permanency we are paying for. In the meantime, the absence of a Science Classroom Building has afforded those of us who frequent the East Bank at night a rare, unobstructed view of the I-35W Bridge (which glows a brilliant cyan at night). So it’s not all bad; it’s not even half bad. The most important lesson to take out of this is that something considered temporary can far surpass its estimated lifespan, and, it is only when something begins to exceed its useful life that we should ever begin to talk of its replacement. I will miss SciCB, there’s no question about that, but I am just now starting to get excited about the future—wherever and whatever it brings us.