Bulletin E-Edition:
What's new in Duckville
It's a time of growth at the University of Oregon campus
By John Gottberg Anderson •
For
/ The Bulletin
Published: November 08. 2009 4:00AM PST
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Deady Hall is the oldest building on the University of Oregon campus. When it was built in 1876, it housed the entire institution. Today, the UO's mathematics department has its offices in the national historic landmark.
John Gottberg Anderson / For The Bulletin
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EUGENE — There was more to the University of Oregon football team's big win last weekend over the University of Southern California squad than the tsunami of excitement felt by sports fans across the United States.
The victory also reinforced enthusiasm among townspeople for a wave of new construction that is turning the Eugene campus into a national showcase of campus architecture.
Led by donations from Nike Chairman Phil Knight, an Oregon alumnus and the athletic program's most generous supporter, work on several new athletic facilities is proceeding on schedule. The 12,541-seat Matthew Knight Arena will replace the antiquated McArthur Court as the school's basketball venue in December 2010, the same month that the John E. Jaqua Academic Center for Student Athletes is scheduled to open. A new baseball park and expanded track facilities are also in the works.
But the growth of the UO campus extends well beyond Duck athletics. On a visit to my alma mater on the eve of the USC game, I was impressed by the continuing expansion of the Oregon campus and the new opportunities being offered to students. It seemed that everywhere I looked around the periphery of the central campus, construction workers were busy with one project or another.
For the 2008-09 year, the Oregon University System fact book reports that UO was the state's second-largest university with 21,500 students, after Portland State's 26,400 but ahead of Oregon State's 20,300. That year it was attended by students from all 50 states, and its 1,222 international students came from 83 countries. About 120 buildings stretch across its 295 acres, covering more than 50 square blocks on the east side of Eugene and extending north, beyond the Willamette River, to the main sports complex anchored by Autzen Stadium.
A city within a city, there is a lot to see and do on a visit of a day or two, starting with two marvelous museums.
The art museum
The Jordan Schnitzer Museum of Art got its start in 1933 as a museum of Asian art, and the original building, designed by Ellis Lawrence, still is a singularly distinctive architectural work. Elegant brickwork, complemented by iron grills and decorative moldings, contributed to its listing on the National Register of Historic Places.
In 2002, the museum closed for renovation and expansion. When it reopened in 2005 — with a new name to honor its major donor — it had increased exhibit space, working studios and interactive galleries, a lecture hall, a reception area, a gift shop and a delightful and popular cafe.
Located next to the Knight Library on the west side of campus, the museum still boasts impressive collections of Chinese, Japanese and Korean paintings, sculptures, furnishings and textiles. It has added a broad collection of 20th-century American regional art, highlighted by the single-largest collection of works by renowned Pacific Northwest artist Morris Graves (1910-2001). Graves, whose work reflects an almost-mystical fascination with nature and Asian culture, is represented by more than 100 paintings and some 400 sketches.
A current exhibit on the history of photography (scheduled through Dec. 13) gives the Schnitzer Museum a forum for displaying selections from its own collection — including work by Edward Weston, Imogen Cunningham and even Andy Warhol — as well as on-loan photography by Alfred Stieglitz and Dorothea Lange.
The museum also features a permanent exhibit of Russian Orthodox paintings and icons. And through Jan. 3, 2010, “Faster Than a Speeding Bullet: The Art of the Superhero” is drawing scores of comic-book fans through the Schnitzer's doors. An adjunct to the temporary exhibit is a series of Japanese wood-block prints of mythical Asian superheroes created in the 19th century, decades before Superman or Batman were even sparkles in their creators' eyes.
The cultural museum
At the other end of the Oregon campus, next to the Knight Law Center seven blocks east of the Museum of Art, is the Museum of Natural and Cultural History. The first of three phases of a $9.5 million expansion was completed this summer, adding a new collections center to the building; a new exhibit hall and research wing are forecast to be ready by 2011.
The head of a spawning chinook salmon, extending from a cedar shake roof, greets visitors to this museum, which has a collection focused on natural history, anthropology and paleontology. Its signature exhibit, called “Oregon: Where Past Is Present,” has been developed as much for adults as for children. Among its displays are the full skeleton of a sabertooth cat, native to Oregon in prehistoric times, and a pair of shoes said to be the world's oldest: The sagebrush-bark sandals were found at Fort Rock Cave in 1938 and carbon-dated to more than 9,300 years.
The museum's collection of American Indian art and artifacts spans a full 15,000 years. The Thomas Condon Collection is the 12th largest in the United States in terms of fossil vertebrates, with about 100,000 specimens available for research inspection. It also features thousands of plants and invertebrate marine fossils, principally from the John Day area. And the Luther Cressman Collection of artifacts from Oregon's Outback features not only those ancient sandals, but also several hundred pre-1900 baskets.
As University of Oregon faculty and students also have worked around the world on archaeological digs, many global discoveries are on exhibit as well. These include such handcrafted items as weapons, musical instruments and textiles from Africa, southeast Asia and Oceania. In fact, the museum's collections include more than a 500,000 artifacts from around the world.
Adjoining the cultural museum is the Many Nations Longhouse, a 2005 collaboration between the university and Oregon's nine federally recognized tribes. Designed by Johnpaul Jones, a UO graduate and one of the world's leading American Indian architects, the building is a gathering place for interaction between students and tribal groups.
A campus tour
Visitors who have never before ventured to the Oregon campus may want to begin with a 90-minute guided tour. Starting on the northeast edge of campus at Oregon Hall, where the Office of the Registrar is located, the free tours begin at a ground-floor information desk at 9:30 a.m. and 1:30 p.m. Monday to Friday and at 10:30 a.m. Saturdays. While these student-led tours are largely geared to orienting new and potential students and their families to the campus atmosphere, they also offer a good look at the entire campus, including the following:
Erb Memorial Union. The student-union building, strategically located at the heart of campus, is open from morning to midnight seven days a week, and campus visitors are welcome without restriction. From a food court to a coffee lounge, from a concert-ticket window to a pool hall, the scene at the EMU is always abuzz. The offices of student government, the international student center, the student newspaper and radio station, a post office, a craft center and much more are located here.
The Knight Library. Designed by Ellis Lawrence in 1937 (and, like the Museum of Art, on the National Register of Historic Places), the main campus library has a collection of more than 2.6 million books and 17,500 journals, many in electronic format. A major expansion and modernization project, undertaken in 1992, preserved the original design while bringing services up to date with modern technology.
The Knight Law Center. Home to the School of Law, with strong programs in public-interest law, business, environmental and oceanic law, and dispute resolution, this building also contains the Wayne Morse Center for Law and Politics. Named for a longtime Oregon senator (1900-74), the Morse Center currently is leading legal inquiries into climate ethics.
The Lillis Business Complex. With its beautiful, open four-story atrium, technologically advanced classrooms and solar-driven electricity system, this building was recognized for its environmental sensitivity by the U.S. Green Building Council. Shade controls regulate temperature and glare, while sensors turn off lights when they are not in use.
The Miller Theatre Complex , currently showing “Big River,” a Tony Award-winning musical based on Mark Twain's “Adventures of Huckleberry Finn,” also houses the acclaimed schools of music, dance and art. A highlight of the music year is the Oregon Bach Festival, now in its 41st year; most performances are held either at the Hult Center for the Performing Arts, in downtown Eugene, or at the Beall Concert Hall on the university campus. The Bach festival is next scheduled for June 25 to July 11, 2010, and supporting events are ongoing through the 2009-10 school year.
Campus sculpture. Most revered among dozens of works on campus are “The Pioneer” (1919), outside Fenton Hall, and “Pioneer Mother” (1932), near Gerlinger Hall. Both sculptures — by Alexander Phimister Proctor — have been popular campus meeting spots for decades.
The Pioneer Cemetery. The southern side of the campus is wrapped around this historic graveyard, where some headstones date back to 1873.
The athletic complex
The Pioneer Cemetery lies opposite the west face of McArthur Court, whose own future is uncertain. The home of the UO basketball team since 1927, and one of the oldest arenas still in use on an American campus, it will be replaced by the new Matthew Knight Arena at the start of the 2010-11 college season. Its three-tier construction and tightly packed seats have earned it a national reputation as “The Pit” among college sports fans.
The Matthew Knight Arena will occupy the site of a former Williams Bakery adjacent to student residence halls. Its price tag of $200 million will make it the most expensive on-campus arena in the country. Despite some opposition from both students and community members, construction of the facility is continuing.
It is named for chief donor Phil Knight's son, who died in a scuba diving accident at the age of 34.
Just east of McArthur Court is Hayward Field, home to the university's track-and-field team. Tributes to late coach Bill Bowerman and distance runner Steve Prefontaine stand beside its tall entry gates at the corner of Agate Street and East 15th Avenue. The U.S. Olympic Trials were held here in 2008; the national track-and-field championships are scheduled in June 2010.
Going north on Agate Street, at the corner of East 13th Avenue, the new John E. Jaqua Academic Center for Student Athletes is rising ahead of schedule. The all-glass exterior will have study lounges, tutors' offices and other facilities.
The most direct route from the main campus to the university's Casanova Center and Autzen Stadium is on a half-mile paved walk across the Millrace and the Willamette River, through Alton Baker Park. There's much more evidence of spending here.
Autzen Stadium, where the football team plays, is the prime focus. Built in 1967 for what now seems like a paltry amount — $2.5 million — it was named for donor Thomas J. Autzen. A 2002 face-lift and expansion that increased seating to 54,000 cost an additional $90 million. A new baseball stadium, PK Park, is nearing completion to the east of the stadium.
West of the stadium is the Casanova Center, built in 1991 at a cost of $12 million. The Oregon athletic department has offices on its upper floors; athletic locker rooms, weight rooms and treatment facilities are on the lower floors.
Within the building is the Hall of Champions, honoring former players and teams, and presenting the UO's various championship trophies. At the entrance to the display is the massive trophy the Oregon football team won for going to the 1995 Rose Bowl.
The school would like nothing better than to begin 2010 with a return visit to the Rose Bowl, and to end next year with success at the campus' handsome, new basketball arena.
John Gottberg Anderson
can be reached at janderson@bendbulletin.com.
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