54 Years Ago
The December 22, 1970 Golden Transcript showed the holiday card that the Mines Athletic department had sent out that year, which featured a drawing of Engineering Hall, signed by the coaches. The article included a good story about the origins of that building.
According to an unfinished manuscript by Dr. Regis Chauvenet (Mines President, 1883-1892), the building was narrowly saved from the scrap heap. In 1893, the 9th General Assembly appropriated $20,000 for a “Hall of Engineers.” It was to be the second building on campus (the first has since been razed). The bill had been signed by both houses of the legislature and was on its way to the governor.
President Chauvenet and a member of the Board of Trustees were present, waiting for the bill to be signed by the governor, but found it had disappeared. They hurried to the engrossing room, where the final version of the bill was to be produced. There, they were
…confronted with huge piles of “dead” material about to be thrown out as trash. Somewhere in those masses of trash was the appropriation bill. After hours of sifting, spurred on by a fifty dollar reward offer if the bill were found, it was finally located and presented without objection to the governor for signature.
When the pressed red brick building opened in 1894, the half-basement and first floor housed the physics and electrical engineering departments. The top floor was the “draughting” department.
