Last week’s Memory Lane Monday post covering the Alphin Humanities Building had a couple of people asking about the brick buildings in one of the photos. So today we will be going over those buildings, and what stands there now.
Before Lyon College, then Arkansas College, moved to “Butler Hill” there stood three Masonic Home buildings and a sandstone dormitory. The three sturdy old Masonic buildings, each a two-story, red brick structure with a basement, replaced the Isaac J. Long Memorial Building as the focus of campus activity. These buildings were renovated internally in the spring and summer of 1954 preparing them for use as modern facilities of higher education, while the brick and woodwork outside was left to lend an atmosphere of history and tradition. The center, and largest, Masonic building was converted to house the campus library, chapel, bookstore, post office, and Scot Shop. The eastern building housed the administration building, and to the west was the new science building with additional rooms for the music department and student publications. All three buildings housed classrooms and faculty offices.
At 11:15 a.m. on April 19, 1973, Mother Nature decided the campus needed a bit of remodeling. As a tornado quickly yet destructively danced across school grounds, it was the Masonic buildings that took the most damage. The westernmost building was reduced to a pile of bricks and papers, and the eastern building promptly followed suit. The middle building had its roof removed and contents spread across the rubble. But where three buildings met their tragic end, a new building’s story began.
It was decided that where the three Masonic buildings had been razed, a new administrative building would be erected; a 10,000 square foot structure boasting a new “open office” concept, and one of the first college structures in the country to do so. Described then by Highlander editor Gregory Cooper as a, “giant shoebox with a couple sets of McDonald’s ‘golden arches’ attached to the back.” That “McDonald’s” is known today as the Nichols Administration Building, named after the Nichols family in honor of years of support and commitment to the College and our mission!
Is there some Lyon College history you would like to learn about or share? Comment below and let us know!
Original Source can be found here.
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