page_title: Old Main (Utah State University)
section_title: History
hierarchical_section_title: Old Main (Utah State University) / History
caption_attribution_description: English: Utah State University Old Main at night
context_page_description: Old Main was the first building built on the campus of the Agricultural College of Utah, now Utah State University. It sits at the top of Old Main Hill, overlooking the city of Logan to the west, and facing the quad to the east. Old Main is the oldest functioning academic building in Utah.
context_section_description: After rejecting a site on the Providence bench south of town, the Board of Trustees for the new college met in Logan on March 26, 1889 to discuss the placement of buildings on a hillside and plot of land donated by the Logan City Council. The Board approved the current site unanimously, and on April 15, selected the proposal of architect C. L. Thompson for a "College Building" to be constructed. Excavation began and the cornerstone was laid on July 27, 1889, and the south wing of the building was completed on February 22, 1890.
  The original building cost $20,305 and spanned 270 by 100 feet. The plans were soon redrawn by Logan architect Karl Conrad Schaub, however, and the central wing was expanded substantially, whereas under Thompson's plans, it had served merely as a hallway between the north and south wings. The entirety of the building was finished by 1902, with the front door originally facing west, overlooking the Cache Valley. At this time, the building contained the entirety of the college. Over the years, as campus has expanded, portions of the building have served many purposes, ranging from classrooms to administration to a makeshift hospital during the Spanish flu epidemic in 1919. In its history, the building has housed nearly every department on campus.
  A single hand-rung bell was installed in Old Main tower in 1904, and additional bells were added in 1914 and 1915. Though the originals were replaced with an electronic carillon in 1978, the tower continues to chime at 15-minute intervals throughout each day.
  Old Main was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1972. In 1984 the building suffered a major fire, but was completely rehabilitated and restored over a period of about 15 years by Architectural Design West of Logan, Utah which was the company founded by Old Main's original architect Karl Schaub nearly 100 years earlier.
caption: Old Main at night, November 2016
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