Modern Memorial Hall Basement Could Easily Hold Activities Center

Ten feet beneath the Victorian grotesqueness of Memorial Hall lies a mass of sleek, modern offices that may soon become an Activities Center for University students.

If the Saltonstall Committee has its way and if the cost is not prohibitive, the Psychological and Psycho-acoustic laboratories will be evicted from their futuristic basement lair and the space given over to extra-curricular activities.

Compared with the huge pile of Gothic above it, the Psychology Department's home is as out of place as a television set in a monastery. Bright tile floors, fluorescent lighting, carved woodwork, and brick glass inlays give an aura of ultra-modernism that outdistances anything else in the University.

Suitable for SAC

The whole set-up jibes perfectly with the ideal conception of SAC. In the paychology section alone are 40 offices neatly lined along the long corridors. Fifteen rooms are large enough for such clubs as the World Fedoralists to hold all their meetings. Three could support Liberal Union parloys, while at least one could accommodate over 100 persons.

The Alumni Committee for a University Memorial Activities Center has estimated that 21,000 square feet of floor space would be needed to house the many student organizations. Memorial Hall's basement boasts 30,000 square feet.

Should the architects decide that more meeting rooms and less offices are needed, contractors could do the job at a minimum of expense. Offices are so arranged that a group of them can be changed to an assembly chamber by simply tearing down a few walls. In most cases this can be done without touching plumbing and electrical connections.

Clubs Could Move In Today

Even without any changes, clubs could move into the offices today and find their needs almost completely satisfied. Except in the Psyche-acoustic section, there is little machinery or technical equipment that would have to be moved. The existing photographic darkrooms, wood and metal shops could be turned over to student groups.

The basement futurama is divided into two sections. Under the "hall" of Memorial Hall is the neat and modernistic home of the Psychology Department. Under Sanders Theater and the transept are the Psycho-acoustic laboratories.

Technical Rooms Under Sanders

This second and smaller section looks slightly more like the conventional cellar, with the ceiling now criss-crossed by bare pipes. Several rooms, such as the noise and anechoic chambers, are of a completely technical nature. The curved eastern end of the building squeezes several rooms into pie-shaped sectors.

The larger western section is far neater and better adapted for SAC. Two parallel corridors run the length of the floor and are joined at each end in the center by shorter crossways, thus forming a squarish figure "8".

All corridors are six feet wide and have tile floors, fluorescent lights, and ivory-painted walls. Around the outside are 47 rooms of various sizes; inside the two blocks of the "8" are the shops, library, and seminar room.

The library is a modernistic job in red and maple. The seminar room, featuring a large oval conference table, is well adapted to steering committee meetings. Upstairs on ground level is a smart-looking sloping auditorium that can hold 111 persons on wide theater seats.

This auditorium is probably the most modernistic lecture hall in the University. Windows are all closed off, so a flick of a switch can darken the room for slides or movies. A tile floor, twenty fluorescent fixtures and a curved platform add to the modernistic atmosphere.

Entrance to the whole set-up is around the corner to the left of the main Mem Hall doors.