6  Cultivating New Ground

A drawing of the main library, dedicated in 1969 and subsequently named for Herman B Wells in 2005.

Herman B Wells Library

In the United States, the corporate integrity of the university lies in the college idea, as Newman said, which is itself expressed as a territorial entity denominated the campus. The campus contains the indispensable innumerable symbols and structures: buildings, gardens, bridges, walks, avenues, glades, statues, plazas, fountains, statuary, towers, gateways and also follies, quirky leftover inheritances in the form of inscriptions, unlikely structures and almost unusable ones.
—Sheldon Rothblatt, A Note on the Integrity of the University

Between 1938 and 1980, Indiana University grew in size, scope, and stature. The global war that consumed the world from 1939 to 1945 accelerated both the extent and the pace of change, and the postwar campus that emerged was faithful to the unique design tradition that had been growing for sixty years. Under the leadership of President Herman Wells until 1962, the Bloomington campus served a student body that had increased from five thousand to nearly eighteen thousand when Wells stepped down. Growth continued, reaching thirty thousand by 1970 and thirty-five thousand by 1980. To accommodate the growth and diversification of academic programs, new facilities were added. The decision to provide ample housing options for students on campus fueled the construction of an extensive residential life complex, and the expansion of intercollegiate athletics, both regionally and nationally, meant the provision of specialized sports facilities.

At the beginning of this period, the campus comprised 137 acres—about one-fifth of a square mile. By 1968, thirty years later, it had grown exponentially to encompass nearly the entire northeast quadrant of the city of Bloomington—about 1,900 acres, or three-square miles. Since the late 1960s, its size has held steady at 2,000 acres. University planners had gained a large canvas with which to work, but a large and enduring challenge faced them: how to knit together the old intimate precincts surrounding Dunn’s Woods with recently acquired ground. As the cosmopolitan research university emerged, the elemental design mainstays of trees, stone, and water were employed on a significantly enlarged campus terrain.

6.1 The Campus as a Pedagogical Agent

At the close of the Bryan administration in 1937, there were several major buildings either planned or under construction that would be finished during the first few years of the Wells regime. They included buildings for education (now Simon Music Library and Recital Center), business and economics (now Woodburn Hall), and the physical sciences (now Swain Hall West). Two dormitories for women, Sycamore Hall and Beech Hall (now Morrison Hall), completed the Memorial Hall quadrangle (now Agnes E. Wells Quadrangle); two for men, West Hall (now Edmondson Hall) and North Hall (now Cravens Hall), completed the Men’s Residence Center (now Collins Living-Learning Center), an open quadrangle.1 Finished in collegiate Gothic style, all were substantial limestone buildings that fit into established campus districts. The last building constructed and dedicated before the attack on Pearl Harbor and the entrance of the United States into the Second World War was the Hall of Music, more commonly known as the Auditorium.

Within six months of losing his acting title in 1938, President Wells recommended to the board of trustees that the architectural firm of Eggers & Higgins, from New York City, in collaboration with A. M. Strauss, a Hoosier architect based in Fort Wayne, be responsible for the design of a campus auditorium—the Hall of Music—located at the eastern end of Seventh Street beyond the Men’s Gym. Wells was determined to make his mark on the physical campus by hewing to the established architectural tradition in the first building planned during his administration.2

Excavation began in 1939, but the contractors ran into limestone bedrock that necessitated additional work. Great shelves of rock and immense boulders were unearthed. Rather than carry them away for disposal, they were set aside to create a rock garden immediately north of the building. This scheme not only saved the cost of disposal but also enhanced the campus landscape with an artful mimicking of a natural limestone outcrop. The rock garden, eventually endowed by philanthropist Elsie Sweeney, joined the Sunken Gardens as another place of beauty featuring limestone in its natural state.

Pleased with Eggers & Higgins’ work on the Auditorium, in 1940, IU hired the firm to prepare a feasibility study to add a bowling alley to the Indiana Memorial Union.3 Soon the firm was preparing a site development plan for the entire campus. It was our plan, Wells later wrote, to try to preserve the traditional style of architecture on the old campus with as little modification as possible but, as we moved outward, to allow the buildings to conform with architectural styles then in vogue.4 That meant, in practice, some limited stylistic experimentation with collegiate Gothic as well as a few signature buildings in contemporary modern styles.

Wells lavished care on the planning of a venue that would provide a superior performance space, whether for musical and dramatic productions or lectures and convocations. The Auditorium did double duty as the new permanent gallery for the dramatic murals of Thomas Hart Benton that were exhibited at the 1933 World’s Fair in Chicago.5 The monumental building made possible a new design element previously unseen at the Bloomington campus. Facing west, it was located at the end of Seventh Street atop a small rise and provided an east-west axis along the street. Starting at Dunn Meadow, traveling east, on the right was the IMU and on the left the Men’s Gymnasium, and farther, on the right, was the new Business and Economics Building, with the Auditorium anchoring one end of the axis. At the request of Wells, Eggers & Higgins sketched a plan for an open quadrangle of buildings next to the Auditorium. They produced a scheme for a building for the fine arts on the north and an open-air amphitheater on the south slope, near the Jordan River.

In addition, the Wells administration began a relationship with landscape architect Frits Loonsten in 1940. Based in Indianapolis, the Dutch-trained Loonsten had a great feeling for the natural and was able to figure out ways to seamlessly combine new landscaping with the old.6 As the campus grew, additional green areas were set aside in keeping with the woodland theme established in the late nineteenth century.

Although classes continued to meet during the war years, mobilization caused significant changes. Several armed forces training programs used the campus buildings and grounds, and the academic calendar was accelerated, with classes year-round and three annual commencements. Students in military uniforms mingled with civilian undergraduates, sharing an earnest spirit. Each class from 1940 to 1945 revived the tradition of funding limestone gates to pierce the low stone walls along campus boundaries on Third Street and on Indiana Avenue.7

As the Second World War was ending, Wells prepared for the predicted wave of increased enrollments, which would mean increased pressure on the campus physical plant and facilities. With a banker’s foresight, he directed the treasurer’s office to buy contiguous tracts of land from willing sellers. Between 1944 and 1955, the campus added nearly 1,000 acres to the 140 acres extant at the start of the Wells administration. Expanding in a northeastward direction, IU now occupied a whole quadrant of Bloomington, a town of less than thirty thousand.8 Sitting on this land-bank, the university had plenty of room to grow.

6.2 Postwar Growth

The board of trustees had a nostalgic impulse in 1947 when they communicated birthday wishes to William Ogg, who had turned ninety-six on September 12. Every one of the trustees knew Ogg, the former keeper of grounds from 1899 to 1938, who exalted this humble position to make it one of great importance and inspiration in their lives and in the lives of countless students and faculty members. The board resolved: Through fidelity to the task which he loved, through kindness, friendliness and virtue of his noble life, he enriched the lives of all of us. He gave flowers for all and their message of beauty and peace went into the lives of all who trod this campus. He gave us trees, and many of the oaks planted by his hands stand today straight and strong to shelter and guide all who come this way. They all symbolized the full life of this kind and faithful gentleman who served his fellow man in full measure.9

The unassuming gardener died a year later, a week after his ninety-seventh birthday. The trustees prepared a memorial resolution, similar in substance to the birthday wishes given the year before. In addition to his planting work that brightened the lives of those who took the campus paths, the measure of which service will never be known, Ogg provided a sympathetic ear. As he was working outside, he talked with people in his calm, pleasant and manly way, and many a one has gone out of his way just to have a chat with Mr. Ogg, their friend.10

The postwar world’s shape, with its contradictions and opportunities, was still emerging, but it was already clear it would be different than the prewar situation. On campus, enrollment doubled in 1946, from 5,000 to 10,000, and a great building program was soon underway. No longer would the campus revolve around the historic core of Dunn’s Woods as more precincts were developed and activity shifted to new locations. New academic structures and residence halls and dining facilities claimed attention among the campus community. The old quadrangle surrounding Dunn’s Woods would remain, still in daily use, but gradually metamorphizing into a historic landmark.

Student housing was the direst need, and temporary quarters in military surplus barracks and house trailers were obtained and pressed into service. For instance, in 1945 a trailer park with three hundred units was set up on Woodlawn Field, across from the Men’s Residence Center, named Woodlawn Courts. Meanwhile, plans to construct and build a system of dormitories to the east of the Auditorium were pursued. The first, Rogers II (now the Ashton Center), was opened in 1945, followed by several apartment complexes and the Men’s Quadrangle (now Wright Quadrangle) in 1949. They were followed by Smithwood Hall (1955, now Read Hall), Tower Quadrangle (1959, now Teter Quadrangle), Campus View Apartments (1962), Foster Quadrangle (1963), McNutt Quadrangle (1964), Tulip Tree Apartments (1965), Wilkie Residence Center (1965), Forest Quadrangle (1966), and Eigenmann Hall (1968).11

Military surplus Quonset huts sprang up everywhere, even near the old quadrangle, to provide needed space for overflowing academic programs. In 1947, to provide practice and performance space for the School of Music, the university obtained a surplus airplane hangar from an Illinois airport and designated East Hall, which included a one-thousand-seat auditorium, the first home for the opera program.12 During the postwar building boom, President Wells made a regular tour of construction sites. He talked with contractors, foremen, workmen, and university personnel. He climbed through partially constructed buildings, inquired about schedules, and prayed for good weather, good labor relations, and speed.13

Among the new postwar programs, one depended on campus soil. In 1948, Assistant Professor of Botany Barbara Shalucha, with the support of her department and President Wells, started a youth gardening program on undeveloped campus land on East Tenth Street. Modeled after the Brooklyn Botanical Garden’s program, where Shalucha was previously employed, it was designed to teach basic horticultural techniques and environmental science. IU cooperated with the City of Bloomington’s Parks and Recreation Department and the Bloomington Garden Club to provide a practical outdoor laboratory for area youth.14

In 1961, newly installed lighting in the Well House threatened the kissing tradition, the Indiana Daily Student reported. At midnight, it seemed as though couples were giggling and talking to each other instead of kissing in keeping with tradition. The reporter noted, The founding fathers located the building away from campus lights and the beaten path for a purpose…. If the lights remain, the Well House seems doomed to become nothing more than an open-air Commons. Coke and candy machines will probably be installed. This is carrying student enlightenment too far. It is a glaring error.15 This lighthearted story proved campus usage patterns were changing as the student body grew and the physical plant increased. Dunn’s Woods lost its centrality after the Second World War as other nodes of campus activity came into existence serving the needs of an increasingly cosmopolitan institution.

Another example of the turn away from the old quadrangle occurred in the early 1960s. The campus, in a vigorous postwar building program, also looked to existing buildings to address the perennial problem of creating academic space. But older facilities sometimes suffered under the bias toward the new. In 1963, Lindley Hall (formerly Science Hall), built sixty years earlier as the fifth academic hall on the old quadrangle, was worn and verging on decrepit. The president and the trustees identified Lindley Hall as a possible candidate for replacement in a structural review.16 The review indicated that the building was not so severely dilapidated that it would make sense to tear it down, so some modest repairs and improvements were approved. Looking back, this decision upheld the design integrity of the original quadrangle, thus avoiding the mistake of many other universities that destroyed their architectural legacies.17

6.3 Tying the Present to the Past

Amid the postwar transformation of the campus to serve a great expansion of IU’s mission of education, research, and service, a faculty member reflected on the role of trees in shaping the design of the physical plant. In 1960, botany professor emeritus Paul Weatherwax published a short article, Familiar Trees Greet Returning Alumni, in The Review, a publication for arts and sciences alumni. A specialist on the evolution of the corn plant, Weatherwax received both his undergraduate and graduate degrees from IU and started teaching in 1918. Well acquainted with fellow botany professor David Mottier, he shared an appreciation for the southern Indiana landscape. His article empathizes with returning alumni: New buildings everywhere, old buildings with new names, new walks and drives, and memories of old thoroughfares which can no longer be found, all add up to a bewildering picture of growth and change. But campus trees turn out to be faithful old landmarks—something to tie the present to the past.

The article went on to briefly recount the history of campus design, focusing on the role and care of trees, including tree surgery. Naturally, the botanist included some comments on tree identification. Countering the common misperception that every kind of tree that grew in Indiana was to be found on the campus and that there were hundreds and hundreds of them, Weatherwax stated that there were fewer than 150 species across the Hoosier state and perhaps fewer than seventy to be found on the campus. He went on a verbal tour around campus, pointing out a dozen or so species, including beech, sugar maple, oak, sycamore, tulip poplar, tamarack, bald cypress, ginkgo, and pine. He gently exhorted, To live among the trees without knowing anything about them is much like living in a foreign country among people whose names you do not know and whose language you do not understand…. The time and effort invested in learning something about the trees and other natural things in our environment will yield generous dividends for a lifetime.18 Weatherwax’s article caught the eye of President Wells, a fellow tree-lover.

In 1961, in his last year as president, Wells wrote a two-page letter to Weatherwax urging him to expand the article into a pamphlet to enlighten incoming freshmen about the design history of their campus and to promote this legacy to visitors and alumni. He went into some detail, eleven points in all, about the proposed content. Wells thought it would be a very great contribution to the building of affection for our Alma Mater. Ending the letter with one final thought—put in a ringing warning against any plan to put buildings in the wooded areas, Wells reaffirmed yet again the administrative commitment to preserve and protect the trees.19

Weatherwax took Wells’s suggestion and revised the text into a booklet, The Woodland Campus of Indiana University, first published in 1966. More than a guide for tree identification, it was a testimonial to the campus design path that the university had taken over the previous seventy-five years and was designed to inspire pride in the aesthetic qualities of the contemporary campus. Enlivened with anecdotes and historical tidbits, about half the content concerned tree identification, aided by a map for a self-guided tour of the sylvan beauty of the campus.

Wells, the university chancellor since 1962, provided an introduction in the form of a letter to the students of Indiana University. Proclaiming we share a priceless heritage, he wrote, Our campus is unique and beautiful. It is unique because it preserves areas of forest, maintained in as near natural state as daily use by thousands of us will permit. Wells wrote of the beauty revealed through each season and the need for breathing space in the face of increasing urbanization. Paying tribute to earlier conservationists, he stated, To cut a tree unnecessarily has long been an act of treason against our heritage and the loyalty, love, and effort of our predecessors who have preserved it for us. After a paragraph explaining the mission of the IU Foundation, he suggests: Our forest trees are your link to the past. The Indiana University Foundation is your link to the future. Wells, paraphrasing an earlier speech, hoped, May you find on the campus, especially the old quadrangle, the beauty and sanctuary which will inspire you to dream long dreams of future usefulness to society.20

In the main text, Weatherwax invited the reader to pause occasionally and appreciate this unusual beauty which has been enjoyed for many generations which of those who have preceded you, adding the hope that support to preserve this heritage will result. After a brief discussion of the old seminary campus and the move to Dunn’s Woods, Weatherwax highlighted various groundskeepers, including William Ogg, along with faculty members David Mottier and J. Van Hook, as key figures in the creation of the woodland campus. Weatherwax dryly noted that the removal of a tree for any reason has always been a fighting matter, with emotion often pitted against sound judgement. He explained, In spite of misguided protests, better judgement generally prevailed, and the campus developed by a series of compromises.21

Moving to open space planning, Weatherwax talked about the lands east of Jordan Avenue, where residential halls were being constructed amid wartime surplus buildings serving as temporary dormitories. The makeshift structures, each named after a native tree (e.g., Pine Hall) and known collectively as Trees Center, were to be removed, and afterward, it is hoped that it will revert to the original forested state. Despite strong pressures to further develop open land for practical uses in the future, these spots of natural beauty on the campus, our most stable link with our pioneer past, must be preserved for future generation, Weatherwax maintained.22

Turning from politics to botany, Weatherwax admitted that trees on a college campus have, at best, a hard time of it, as they face a host of environmental challenges caused by the man-made hardscape even though they receive dedicated care. Effort is made to steer a sensible course between what is best for the trees and what use is to be made of the campus. The basic biology of trees and their life cycles were presented, and the roles of native wildflowers and animals were also mentioned. A list of nearly one hundred trees you may wish to recognize was followed by a map of the older parts of campus that noted the locations of sixty species. About half of the booklet was devoted to the campus tree guide, describing both common and unusual species found on the campus.23

With its pedagogic aims of environmental education coupled with an appreciation of the natural landscape, the booklet had wide appeal and addressed many interests—historical, artistic, ecological, philanthropic, recreational, as well as educational. Waxing poetic, Weatherwax summed up the main point: There are few places in the world where great laboratories, classrooms, libraries, and other centers of intellectual and artistic activity are located in an environment which retains its primeval character—few places where one may so quickly go to shed the tensions and anxieties of this complex modern world in quiet meditation.

He added a challenge: Are we so poor that we cannot afford to preserve this precious heritage? Indeed, are we so rich that we can afford to lose it?24 The pamphlet went through several revisions and republications in the years following.

The Woodland Campus of Indiana University considered the campus worthy of consideration, over and apart from its daily functioning, for a myriad of educational activities. Campus design was explicitly connected to pedagogical purposes, and knowing the history of a basic natural feature—trees—was deemed valuable. Among the important messages conveyed by this publication was that students learn from the environment surrounding them, both indoors and outside.

The booklet was published when the presidential administration of Elvis J. Stahr was well underway. His administration, lasting from 1962 to 1968, saw the conclusion of a major building program at the Bloomington campus that stretched back to the 1930s. As the rate of enrollment increase began to slow, the commitment to house a sizable portion of students on campus neared completion. The main campus reached nearly 2,000 acres—its present size. Of the dozen major buildings and facilities completed during his tenure, seven were housing for students and three were for academic departments.25

Beyond Bloomington, there was a surge of construction at the IU Extension Centers located around the state, as the university underlined its educational commitment to regional hubs through bricks or limestone and mortar. In 1968, the centers gained more autonomy and were designated regional campuses.26

6.4 Earth Day 1970

The startling view of Earthrise taken from the Apollo 8 mission to the moon on December 24, 1968, was breathtaking. It offered a new perspective of our planetary home as a beautiful gem in the vastness of space. The idea of Spaceship Earth, given concrete form by the Apollo photographs, presaged the awakening provided by Earth Day in 1970.

As the 1960s wore on, groups of people in various parts of the country focused on problems of pollution of the environment. Toxic emissions from industries and automobiles befouling the air, poisonous waste dumped in rivers and lakes, landfills leaching chemicals into the water table, dangerous insecticides and herbicides, oil spills along the coast, and the tragedy of the commons were debated. The words ecology and environment started to pepper public discourse. Among the national voices were several IU faculty, Elinor Ostrom, Vincent Ostrom, and Lynton Caldwell among them.

Wisconsin senator Gaylord Nelson, aware of these emerging issues, devised a way to increase public consciousness about the fraying of the nation’s ecological fabric: a civic demonstration expressing care of the Earth, first thought of as an environmental teach-in and then as an environmental action day. The senator wisely let planning staff groups from universities, colleges, cities, and towns across the United States plan locally relevant programs. At Indiana University, an organization emerged with the name Crisis Biology to serve as a clearinghouse for Earth Day and related plans. Associate Professor of Botany Donald Whitehead served as chair of the steering committee for Environmental Action Day.27

The schedule of activities for the first Earth Day on April 22, 1970, was impressively extensive. Dunn Meadow, the site of numerous music concerts and protest demonstrations in the past, was chosen as the site. Bob Scott, a junior, summed up the attraction in the student newspaper; The Revolution Is Here, Escape in Dunn Meadow was the headline:

It is the communal ground and ancestral home for the young. It is I.U.’s continuing Woodstock. In Dunn Meadow, people run wild and go crazy in the spring, in all of the good weather and some of the bad. In Dunn Meadow there is no saturating up-tightness, only the warmth that comes from the closeness of the earth, the blueness of the sky, and the oneness of people being happy. We all want to escape to a Dunn Meadow of the mind…. Dunn Meadow is the spirit of freedom.28

The meadow, acting as the expansive side yard of the Indiana Memorial Union, could handle the large crowd expected.

The organizers scored a coup in attracting Senator Nelson to open the festivities with an address. It was the start of a long two days for him, with speaking engagements in Madison, Milwaukee, Boston, Atlanta, Denver, and Berkeley as well. Bloomington was the smallest metro area on his itinerary.29 Around 2,000 people attended Nelson’s 9:30 a.m. address. Righteous cries of Right on! punctuated the air. Pollution, he declared, was the most important issue facing humanity. Briefly interrupting Nelson’s speech, about ten women dressed as witches performed some guerrilla theater, dancing in a circle and chanting, Save our bodies, save ourselves, demonstrating for the free use of contraceptive devices and against abortion laws. Returning to his remarks, Nelson said the problem of pollution had two aspects, the philosophical and the physical. To counteract the ideology that humans are over, above, and separate from the rest of nature, he called for changes in philosophical beliefs, feelings, and attitudes toward nature. On the physical side, Nelson wanted remedial actions to take place on the national level in addition to state and local efforts.

On the podium with Nelson was Robert Menke, an IU trustee. He reminded the crowd that the concern of past leaders of the environment was demonstrated by IU’s beautiful campus. I have faith in the future, Menke declared, because I have faith in the young people of America.30

After the speeches by Nelson and Menke, the Environmental Fair opened. People were free to visit tables and booths set up in Dunn Meadow where groups with connections to the environment had displays and information. Their subject matter ranged from Planned Parenthood to organic food; from non-detergent soap to a soft drink company’s use of reusable bottles, Indiana Daily Student reporters observed, adding, The sophistication of the exhibits ran the gamut from grade school level crayon posters to a scale model farm pond—complete with fish and frog.31 Rock music accompanied the Environmental Fair all day, with local favorite bands the Screaming Gypsies, Pure Funk, and others providing the soundtrack. Adults and young people, parents and children all intermingled—wandering, dancing, playing Frisbee, wading in the Jordan River (one of the campus’ primary pollution symbols, the reporter noted). Random guerrilla theater continued. Booth workers engaged people in conversation and passed out information. Some, like IU sophomore Steve Gudeman, worried about the intent of the buoyant crowd: I’m afraid they really aren’t serious. I’m interested in seeing how much work is done by the committees after this. The IDS summarized the action at the Environmental Fair: Beneath a sky that never quite had the heart to rain, I.U. played out its bit of Earth Day. The ceremonies were a stew of Indiana 4-H with a strong dash of Woodstock thrown in for flavor.32 Echoing recent protests against the Vietnam War and massive tuition increases, Dunn Meadow was the setting for a new type of demonstration on behalf of the environment.

In keeping with the eclectic and polycentric day, there was a wealth of other activities. There were pollution tours of Bloomington by bus. There was an all-day Environmental Film Program, sponsored by the IU Audio-Visual Center, in Whittenberger Auditorium. Environmental justice themes were the focus of film and discussion: The Environment and the Poor: Someone Pays the Price. A multidisciplinary mini-symposium with IU professors explored Alternatives to Present Urban Trends.33 The Interfraternity Council organized the SMUT (Students March Upon Trash) campaign as a campus cleanup. Residence halls and Greek houses, twenty-five in all, had multiple speakers on environmental topics. At night, WTIU broadcast a televised panel discussion (with a simultaneous radio broadcast on WFIU), Environmental Action Day: A Beginning, with local and state government officials and interested citizens to assess existing problems and prospects for the future.34

Featuring other national figures, an evening symposium in the IU Auditorium closed Earth Day. Entitled Environmental Action: It’s Up to Us, the symposium was moderated by botany professor and chair of the Earth Day committee Donald Whitehead. The speakers included Leon Billings, chief of staff to Senator Edmund Muskie and staff director of the US Senate Subcommittee on Air and Water Pollution, and US Representative Lee Hamilton, representing the ninth congressional district since 1965.35 Back on campus was former IU president Elvis Stahr, two years after he stepped down and assumed the presidency of the National Audubon Society, revitalizing the venerable bird-watching organization into an activist environmental watchdog.36

Representative Hamilton began, With astounding alacrity, we have all become environmentalists, adding, The environment is a politician’s delight because everyone is for clean air, clear water, and tall forests. But he injected a note of caution: In spite of all the protests, meetings, commissions, speeches, legislation, organizations, in spite even of the enormous political popularity of the issue, I am not fully persuaded that we have begun to grasp the dimensions of the environmental task. Hamilton went on to say that we must clearly see the complexities of the task of cleaning up the environment and warned about the dangers of single-minded thinking and of assigning blame to others. The fact is, he declared, that all of us are polluters and all living Americans are big polluters. He spoke of power politics and the voices of industry and business and the trade-offs that are involved: Pollution control may mean short term competitive disadvantage. In his view, management of the environment is above all a political issue, and politics, not science, is the key to whether or not we succeed.

Hamilton saw problems in the proliferation of governmental groups dealing with the environment—11 federal departments, 16 independent agencies, 13 congressional committees, 90 federal programs, 26 quasi-governmental bodies, and 14 interagency committees—with hope that the planned establishment of the Environmental Protection Agency would begin to rationalize the system of federal oversight. Moving to individual lifestyle choices, he suggested giving up so-called luxury if that means squandering and spoiling resources. Hamilton reviewed pending federal legislation concerning the environment and some state initiatives, noting that Indiana would spend 1.9¢ per person in the biennium for air pollution control, in contrast to Kentucky, where 10.4¢ would be expended. He concluded his speech with a lengthy list of steps for everyone to take, dealing with community engagement on a variety of environmental issues. When the hoopla and the shouting die, the flags no longer wave, and Earth Day has come and gone, our task will be to persevere. So join the fray—if you don’t, who will?37

Earth Day was a symptom of a rising tide of environmental consciousness that was sweeping the nation. Congress had just passed the National Environmental Policy Act in 1969 to create and maintain conditions under which man and nature can exist in productive harmony and to assure for all Americans safe, healthful, productive, esthetically and culturally pleasing surroundings.38 It contained an innovative tool of analysis of likely consequences—the Environmental Impact Statement—that all federal projects were required to submit. A new federal institution, the Environmental Protection Agency, was formed in 1970, cobbled together from existing departments and bureaus and designed to rationalize pollution control and establish environmental baselines.

At Indiana University, faculty members were contributing to the national discussion as well as creating new academic frameworks to sustain research, teaching, and service in this arena. Lynton Caldwell, a political science professor, was credited with drafting the text of the 1969 National Environmental Policy Act in collaboration with Senator Henry Jackson’s office. Earlier, in 1963, Caldwell wrote a groundbreaking article, Environment: A New Focus for Public Policy? that helped launch a new subfield.39 On the IU campus, Caldwell and others advocated for the formation of a new school—School of Public and Environmental Affairs—which was created in 1972. Known by its acronym, SPEA was an unusual hybrid, with public policy studies coexisting alongside environmental science programs, with aspirations of cross-fertilization. With the concentration on national and international issues, there was less focus on local environmental issues, although that would slowly change. SPEA, a robust response to emerging issues of concern in modern life, was the first new professional school established at IU in decades. Much of the organizational framework for professional schools had been put in place in the 1920s and had served well since then.

A new presidential administration began in 1971, when the vice president for regional campuses, John W. Ryan, was selected by the board of trustees to serve. An IU Ph.D. alumnus in political science, Ryan was in office for sixteen years, until 1987. His administration supervised the construction of several landmark structures that rounded out the physical plant. In 1971, the Musical Arts Center, perhaps the finest opera house on a college campus in the nation, was completed, as was Assembly Hall (now Simon Skjodt Assembly Hall) to provide a venue to showcase IU basketball. Ten years later, the IU Art Museum (now the Eskenazi Museum of Art), with a starchitect building by I. M. Pei, complemented the Fine Arts Plaza, and the new Bill Armstrong Stadium provided a field for the IU soccer teams as well as a track for Little 500 cycling races.

In 1980, the original campus at Dunn’s Woods, including nine historic buildings on the old quadrangle and the remnant woodland, was listed on the National Register of Historic Places. The listing was a local outgrowth of historic preservation awareness and initiatives that stemmed from the 1976 national bicentennial. The nomination packet of text and pictures referred to these historic buildings collectively as the Old Crescent, certainly an evocative appellation, albeit completely new. This coinage rounded off the corners of the old quadrangle, bundled the buildings together, and inscribed a venerable label for a historic precinct. Old Crescent caught on quickly, unlike University Park nearly a century earlier.40

  1. J. Terry Clapacs, Indiana University Bloomington: America’s Legacy Campus (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2017), 68–70, 126–31, 172–75, 204–14.↩︎

  2. Herman B Wells, Being Lucky: Reflections and Reminiscences (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1980), 198; James H. Capshew, Herman B Wells: The Promise of the American University (Bloomington; Indianapolis: Indiana University Press; Indiana Historical Society Press, 2012), 123–25.↩︎

  3. Indiana University Board of Trustees, “Minutes of the Board of Trustees of Indiana University, 25 March 1940–26 March 1940” (Bloomington: Indiana University Archives & Indiana University Libraries Digital Collections Services, March 25, 1940), https://purl.dlib.indiana.edu/iudl/archives/iubot/1940-03-25.↩︎

  4. Wells, Being Lucky, 198.↩︎

  5. James H. Capshew, “The Campus as a Pedagogical Agent: Herman Wells, Cultural Entrepreneurship, and the Benton Murals,” Indiana Magazine of History 105, no. 2 (2009): 179–97, https://www.jstor.org/stable/27792978.↩︎

  6. Wells, Being Lucky, 199.↩︎

  7. From the corner of Third and Indiana, going east along Third Street: 1942, 1941, 1929, 1926, 1943, 1940; and going north: 1944, 1945.↩︎

  8. US Census counts for Bloomington were 20,870 in 1940, 28,163 in 1950, and 31,357 in 1960.↩︎

  9. Indiana University Board of Trustees, “Minutes of the Board of Trustees of Indiana University, 12 September 1947–13 September 1947” (Bloomington: Indiana University Archives & Indiana University Libraries Digital Collections Services, September 12, 1947), https://purl.dlib.indiana.edu/iudl/archives/iubot/1947-09-12.↩︎

  10. Indiana University Board of Trustees, “Minutes of the Board of Trustees of Indiana University, 01 October 1948–02 October 1948” (Bloomington: Indiana University Archives & Indiana University Libraries Digital Collections Services, October 1, 1948), https://purl.dlib.indiana.edu/iudl/archives/iubot/1948-10-01.↩︎

  11. Clapacs, Indiana University Bloomington, pp. 216–248. See Thomas D. Clark, Indiana University: Midwestern Pioneer: Volume III: Years of Fulfillment, 4 vols. (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1977), p. 197-225↩︎

  12. Clapacs, Indiana University Bloomington, 72–75; Clark, Indiana University, 485, 498.↩︎

  13. Clark, Indiana University, 212.↩︎

  14. JoAnn C. Bunnage, “Barbara Shalucha and the Development of Hilltop Garden and Nature Center: The Cultivation of a Community Treasure” (1999).↩︎

  15. Ralph Hunt, “Enlightening Situation? Well House Wattage Encourages Conversation Rather Than Action,” Indiana Daily Student, November 1, 1961.↩︎

  16. Indiana University Board of Trustees, “Minutes of the Board of Trustees of Indiana University, 31 May 1963–03 June 1963” (Bloomington: Indiana University Archives & Indiana University Libraries Digital Collections Services, May 31, 1963), https://purl.dlib.indiana.edu/iudl/archives/iubot/1963-05-31.↩︎

  17. Clapacs, Indiana University Bloomington, 40.↩︎

  18. Paul Weatherwax, “Familiar Trees Greet Returning Alumni,” The Review, May 1960, 12–18.↩︎

  19. Herman B. Wells, “Letter to Paul Weatherwax” (Lilly institution/LMC 2283/B4/F Wells, Herman B., August 22, 1961).↩︎

  20. Paul Weatherwax, The Woodland Campus of Indiana University (Bloomington: Indiana University, 1966), 2–3.↩︎

  21. Weatherwax, 5–7.↩︎

  22. Weatherwax, 12.↩︎

  23. Weatherwax, 13–28.↩︎

  24. Weatherwax, 17.↩︎

  25. Student housing: Foster, McNutt, Briscoe, Tulip Tree, Willkie, Forest, and Eigenmann; academic structures for psychology, radio and television, and business. See Clapacs, Indiana University Bloomington, p. 470. In 1966, a faculty Committee on Natural Areas proposed a preliminary plan for University Woods, encompassing the shore of Griffy Reservoir and the University Lake area, for further development of research and teaching. See J. A. Franklin, “Letter to Thomas D. Brock” (Indiana University Archives/C268/B13/F Committee, Natural Areas, July 21, 1966).↩︎

  26. For basic information on the history of the regional campuses, see IU History: Campuses & Context↩︎

  27. Harold Schlechtweg, “Environmental Day Activities Listed,” Indiana Daily Student, April 20, 1970.↩︎

  28. Bob Scott, “The Revolution Is Here, Escape in Dunn Meadow,” Indiana Daily Student, April 20, 1970.↩︎

  29. Sue Bischoff, “Nelson Pleased by Turnout, Originality,” Indiana Daily Student, n.d.↩︎

  30. Harold Schlechtweg, “Nelson Outlines Proposals to End National Pollution,” Indiana Daily Student, April 23, 1970.↩︎

  31. Ken Ferries and Linda Herman, “Woodstock, 4-H Flavor I.U. Environmental Fair,” Indiana Daily Student, April 23, 1970.↩︎

  32. Ferries and Herman.↩︎

  33. The speakers were professors Frederick Churchill, Lloyd Orr, George Smerk, and Al Ruesink.↩︎

  34. “Environmental Action Day April 22 Schedule of Activities,” Indiana Daily Student, April 22, 1970.↩︎

  35. Billings was a major architect of the Clean Air Act, signed by President Nixon on December 31, 1970. See also Sam Roberts, “Leon G. Billings, Architect of Clean Air and Clean Water Acts, Dies at 78,” New York Times, November 17, 2016.↩︎

  36. Schlechtweg, “Environmental Day Activities Listed”.↩︎

  37. Lee Hamilton, “The Popularity of the Environmental Issue” (Indiana University Archives/Lee H. Hamilton Congressional Papers, 1965–1998/MPP2B142/Folder 18, Speech Book 16, Q., April 22, 1970).↩︎

  38. “The Guardian: Origins of the EPA,” EPA Historical Publication-1, Spring 1992.↩︎

  39. Lynton K. Caldwell, “Environment: A New Focus for Public Policy?” Public Administration Review 23 (1963): 132–39.↩︎

  40. I have not found any references to Old Crescent relating to the IUB campus until after the NRHP designation. The nomination form was prepared by Daniel F. Harrington, c/o Indiana Geological Survey, on behalf of the Indiana University Heritage Committee. The Name box had historic and/or common; The Old Crescent was listed as the common name. “The Old Crescent” (NRHP Inventory-Nomination Form; United States Department of the Interior: Heritage Conservation and Recreation Service, 1980).↩︎