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over eighty years its stately dome and classical lines have stood
in the center of the Texas A&M University campus as the very
symbol of academic life on the campus. Indeed, as the prestige of
the university has grown over the last quarter century, it has
become a symbol of academic excellence recognized around the
world. Completed in 1914 on the site of Old Main and surrounded on
all sides by such venerable old stalwarts as Bolton Hall, Nagle
Hall, the YMCA and the Cushing Memorial Library, the Academic
Building is the focal point of the most scenic and historic spot
on the campus of Texas A&M University.
Texas A&M Architecture instructor Samuel E.
Gideon produced the classical design and College Architect F. E.
Giesecke designed the structure. Together they created a structure
for the ages, all for only $225,000. To Langford,
the Academic Building was the "grand old dame" of
the campus. It was built to ensure that fire would never again
destroy another principal Texas A&M building. In fact, it was
the first major campus building to be constructed with a
structural frame of reinforced concrete. In the early 1960s, with
the style of the building under attack by what he labeled as
"latter- day modernists," archivist and architect Ernest
Langford '13 felt compelled to put down his thoughts about the
building.
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(Langford's writing on the architecture of campus buildings can
be found on file in the University Archives, located within the
beautifully refurbished Cushing Memorial Library.)
Grand in scale, the building extends
approximately 260 feet and except for the rotunda, four main beams
support the structure. Twelve-foot wide hallways run from the
rotunda to each end of the building. Steel and concrete abounds in
floor slabs, beams and columns of this now well-known building. It
was, after all, a "Giesecke Building" and Langford was
fond of telling the following
story to illustrate the term and the man. "In the
mid-thirties," explained Langford, "drinking fountains
were being installed in the building and in order to run pipes and
drains to various floors it was necessary to cut holes in the
concrete slabs. In cutting these holes workmen exposed a veritable
mesh of steel reinforcing bars--so many in fact that the only way
they could be removed was to burn them out with a torch. Professor
Giesecke had done the structural design, and when this mesh of
bars was called to his attention he said in a joking sort of way:
‘I knew a whole lot less about reinforced concrete then, than I
do now. So I just figured out the amount of steel which I thought
was necessary and doubled it!'"
Indeed, the only thing that Langford thought
wrong with the building was that the dome was too small for the
scale of the building. He found the rest delightful. He was
especially impressed by the exterior cast stone belt courses,
lintels, cornices, columns and panels. All were made of red
granite that was ground on the construction site. All were formed
with the finest workmanship.
Over the years modifications have masked the
simple charm of the interior. No matter, her basic structure
remains sound, waiting only for a little careful refurbishment and
restoration. As Langford saw it, "she will be around for a
long time."
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