50th anniversary of the groundbreaking of the Assembly Hall
May 20, 2009 11:31 AM
How about a round of "Happy Birthday" to Champaign-Urbana's most famous structure?
Monday marks the 50th anniversary of the groundbreaking - a remarkably understated one, it turns out - for the still-breathtaking University of Illinois Assembly Hall. For a building that was so unusual and so long-awaited, the beginning of construction on Monday, May 25, 1959, passed with little fanfare.
There were no photographs of dignitaries with ribbon-bedecked shovels, as there had been about 35 years earlier across the street at Memorial Stadium. The governor didn't show up, the university trustees were nowhere to be seen, even the president of the university must have been busy with something else.
Some heavy equipment operator whose name was never recorded took a big bite out of the earth that morning and work began on a structure that looks nowhere near 50 years old, or more accurately, 46 years old.
Tom Kacich
Monday marks the 50th anniversary of the groundbreaking - a remarkably understated one, it turns out - for the still-breathtaking University of Illinois Assembly Hall. For a building that was so unusual and so long-awaited, the beginning of construction on Monday, May 25, 1959, passed with little fanfare.
There were no photographs of dignitaries with ribbon-bedecked shovels, as there had been about 35 years earlier across the street at Memorial Stadium. The governor didn't show up, the university trustees were nowhere to be seen, even the president of the university must have been busy with something else.
Some heavy equipment operator whose name was never recorded took a big bite out of the earth that morning and work began on a structure that looks nowhere near 50 years old, or more accurately, 46 years old.
Tom Kacich
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