LIBRARY

Prior to 1925 the Library and its collections had been housed in three different buildings: from 1868-1891 in Old Main; 1891-1914 in Morrill Hall, designed in part as the library; and 1914-1925 in Beardshear Hall because that building was deemed more fireproof than Morrill Hall.

Requests for a new fireproof building were made as early as in the 1902-03 Biennial Report, and were repeated in subsequent reports. In 1909, March 22, the ISC Student reported that

It had been planned all along to put a library in on the millage tax list next after the buildings already authorized, but at a meeting last Wednesday the board of trustees yielded to faculty and student sentiment and put the gymnasium in ahead of the library.

In 1911 the legislature allocated $225,000 of millage tax money for a new library. However, another four years passed before positive steps were taken to initiate the project. A committee was appointed at the Nov. 18, 1915, Board meeting with its purpose “to inspect college and city library buildings, so as to obtain the best ideas concerning such buildings.” The Board architect, Mr. Proudfoot, was authorized to accompany the committee. Tentative plans and specifications were prepared for presentation to the legislature in January 1917.¹ The Board minutes for Feb. 7, 1919, record that the sum of $400,000 for construction of Library Building was approved. A special committee was appointed in October of that year to inspect other recent libraries. The following excerpt is from their report presented to the Board at the Jan. 29, 1920, meeting:

It should be borne in mind that modern college libraries are centralized libraries with departmental collections outside as few and small as possible, and that this centralization reduces the study, recitation, and reading rooms outside and necessitates larger accommodations in the central building and consequently a larger building.

It was not until September 1922 that the project got fully under way. The Sept. 21 minutes show approval of the architect’s plans, with some revision to be made, and authorization for the Superintendent of Buildings and Grounds to make the excavations and construct the foundation. This work started the last week of October.² Bids for the super structure were received on Jan. 30, 1923. The general contract was awarded to Sugarman Construction Company, of Des Moines, for $376,835.³ Mechanical and electrical work was to be done by the Building and Grounds department. Foundations were finished and the superstructure started in April 1923.

The Board minutes for August 15, 1923, record “that a contract for bas relief panels for the new Library Building, has been entered into between the Iowa State Board of Education and Miss Nellie Verne Walker,” in the amount of $2,625. These are the panels over the second floor end windows and on the east front of the building. The designs were Miss Walker’s but much of the actual carving was executed by J.G. Zimmerman.⁴

The names of fourteen famous men are inscribed in a band above the main floor windows on the east front and north and south ends of the original building. The ones so recognized are: Washington, Lincoln, Shakespeare, Emerson, Agassiz, Pasteur, Faraday, Newton, Darwin, Liebig, Morrill, Hatch, (Seaman) Knapp, and (James) Wilson.

Laying of the cornerstone took place on October 11, 1923.

The building was first opened (in part) for use on January 6, 1925. Moving of books from Central (Beardshear) continued for another month. Dedication of the building occured on January 21, 1926.⁵

As early as 1928 the Library had reached the point where additional stack space was needed.⁶ Although the request for an addition was repeated in subsequent biennia, it was 1959 before funds for it were appropriated.

The Grant Wood murals in the Library came into being during the Great Depression of the 1930’s. At the December 12, 1933, Board meeting “President Hughes reported that he had recommended to the Civil Works Administration that a mural by Grant Wood be made for the library at Iowa State College at a cost of approximately $1400.00 for labor and $600.00 for materials and supplies…” The scope of the project, as approved by the CWA was provided in the January 3, 1934, issue of the Iowa State Student:

Murals signifying the various functions of the college are being painted by the college library by unemployed Iowa artists this winter. Work which is being done in the respective artist’s studios about the state is to begin as soon as canvas purchased for the paintings is delivered to the painters.

Grant Wood, of Cedar Rapids, eminent Iowa artist, is chairman of the CWA committee in charge of the project. Mr. Wood has not yet completed the list of artists to be employed.

Preliminary sketches for the murals have already been submitted and approved. Three groups of paintings are to be placed at various points in the library. The first set, consisting of eight works, will depict the practical arts as taught at Iowa State, according to Wood. Another group of six will present the fine arts. These are to be placed in the reference reading room of the building. The third set, to be located in the lower rotunda, will show the work of the pioneer Iowa farmer.

These murals will be based upon Daniel Webster’s quotation: “When tillage begins, the other arts follow. The farmer, therefore, is the founder of American civilization.”

Much of the work on the murals was done in a temporary studio set up in Iowa City where twenty-one artists worked on the project. The CWA project was terminated in the spring of 1934, but the College continued the work on the murals with allocation of its own funds.⁷ That year only the murals in the stairway were completed. The large painting of the pioneer farm was executed in 1936. Seven artists worked on that project. All of the murals were painted under the supervision of Grant Wood and from his original drawings. Close attention was given to accuracy of the details in all of the portrayals.

The limestone figures of two students, located at the foot of the original stairway, were the work of Christian Petersen and were completed and set in place in 1944.

The first addition to the Library was designed in 1959 and construction contracts were awarded in March 1960. It was completed in time for the start of the fall quarter of 1961. This construction, on the west side of the original building, was devoted largely to stack and reader space, although new stairs, an elevator and rest rooms were also included. Perhaps the most obvious feature of the addition was the new entrance rotunda on the south side of the building, making the original east entrance a secondary access, primarily for emergency exit. Final cost of the addition, including equipment, came to $1,172,903.51.

Funds of $1,800,000 for a second addition were appropriated by the legislature in 1965. The following year a federal grant was made by the Higher Education Facilities Commission in the amount of $595,300. Contracts for construction were awarded in July 1967. This addition included construction of the multi-tier stacks and also an extension to the west and north of the first addition. It was opened for use in the fall of 1969.

Continued growth of the Library holdings and the need for additional study and reader space made further expansion of the building a necessity by the mid-seventies. In 1978 the Iowa State Foundation made $400,000 available for planning and steps were taken to initiate that work. Architects were selected in January 1979. Contracts for construction of the third addition are expected to be awarded in 1980.