FAIR OAKS MANSION

At the November 1878 meeting of the Board of Trustees it was

Ordered, that President Welch and Professor Budd be appointed a committee with full power to grant the request of students desiring to erect houses on the college farm, to choose the location, approve plans and have full control in the matter of the erection of said houses.

Fair Oaks Mansion was built by students the following year. The house was built at a location on the east side of the present Communications Building. It appears there on the 1883 map. It is not shown there on a map prepared in 1887. On the later map there is a residence shown about 300 feet west by south of the old Horticulture Hall. This location agrees with Margaret Kooser’s statement of location: “300 ft. west of south end of present library.”¹ Although no record has been found relative to moving the building it seems safe to assume that such a move was made about 1884 or 1885. This is almost certainly the same building as the one referred to as the Bus House in 1892 and 1893. Two references in March 1892, one in The Aurora and one in the IAC Student report that the Bus House was being used to house students.

Herman Knapp, in 1934, attempted to obtain more information about the building through correspondence with men who had been students in the 1880’s, trying to determine who built it. He wrote:

When I came to Ames in the spring of 1880, there was a frame building probably 20 x 24, a story and a half high under a large oak tree quite a little west of the present college cemetery. This building was occupied by boys and I was told at the time that these boys built the house and owned it.²

The reference here to “west of the cemetery” undoubtedly should have been written “east of the cemetery”.

How or when title to the house may have been transferred from the student builders to the college is not recorded.

At the May 2-4, 1893, Board meeting

Pres. Beardshear presented the following: The necessity of moving the house and barn belonging to the Steward’s department from the grounds set aside for the Athletic Association. Referred to Building Committee with instructions to act at once.

It is probable that this house was moved to the south side of the road at the west gate in 1893. It is known that it was moved somewhere that year. The only map that shows a building at west gate is one dated 1896. There is no record of any buildings erected at that location.

In the Board minutes for May 1897 the following entry is made:

Prof. Curtiss has called attention to the gardener’s house and barn, near the west gate. The house has never been plastered and the roof is worn out. The barn is practically a worthless shed. Your committee recommend a new roof and plastering for the house and that the little barn back of South Hall be moved out to make an addition of two rooms to this house. Also that the abandoned stable near the present club house near Morrill Hall be moved out for the services of the Gardener.

(Also see Horticulture Barn-First)

The following month the minutes report that “the barn north of the depot has been moved to gardener’s house near west gate at a cost of ten dollars. We recommend it to be placed in repair.”

The March 14, 1899, issue of the I.A.C. Student recorded: “The unsightly house near the west gate is also removed and one feels as relieved as though a plague had ceased.”