Dartmo.

The Office of Residential Life plans to renovate the ca. 1812 James C. Brown House at 26 East Wheelock as a sorority, The Dartmouth reports. A second building slated to become a sorority house is the Parkside Apartments, a Jens Larson faculty housing block at 17 East Wheelock Street. The firm doing the work is Haynes & Garthwaite.

Meanwhile, the status page for the 4 Currier Street project notes that the three frame buildings on the site have been demolished: 4 Currier Place, 6 Sargent Place, and an outbuilding at 18 South Street.

[Update 09.07.2008: Haynes & Garthwaite information added and Parkside Apartments substituted for Ledyard Apartments, named incorrectly in original post.]

[Update 05.07.2009: Leftover reference to Jens Larson, correct when the post referred to Ledyard Apartments, removed.]

Thayer currently seats 700, according to The Dartmouth. The news release of November 10 regarding the Trustees’ meeting stated that the replacement for Thayer Dining Hall “will have seating for 750 diners and a large performance space.”

Unless the new dining hall does more than Thayer did to create a usable basement or second level or expands significantly into the parking lot behind the building, it seems likely that South Fairbanks (at least) will have to be moved. One assumes it will be moved rather than demolished, since the architects are “green” and would not consign a useful structure to the landfill for merely aesthetic reasons, especially when it is a historic building.

Here’s hoping that the century-old fraternity house designed by Charles Rich is moved to Mass Row (between North Mass and Hitchcock) or is permitted to become part of the new dining hall. Neither approach should be out of reach for a skilled designer.

Atkin Olshin Lawson-Bell Architects is now Atkin Olshin Schade and presently features features Collis and Fahey-McLane on its front page.

The firm’s Collis page has some new photos, including one showing the Lone Pine Tavern. The only detailed plan of the Hitchcock renovation yet available is on the site as well.

Amazing photos of the scoured interior of Hitchcock Hall have been posted to the OPDC site.

The builders only knew the first-floor plan when they put the foundation in during 1912, since the rest of the building had not been designed. One wonders whether any of the concrete piers are afterthoughts.

The OPDC’s November 2006 update of its Construction Maps page has a map showing the footprint of the Thayer Dining Hall replacement.

The map suggests that the new building while occupy about the same site as the old, without threatening South Fairbanks Hall.

Atkin Olshin Lawson-Bell is designing an extensive renovation of Hitchcock Hall, announced on the OPDC project page. The work will involve the demolition of all interior partitions (not the fireplaces), Charles Rich’s original shed-roofed (?) “resort room” in the crook of the ell, and the room’s early-1980s one-level flat-roofed expansion by Charles Hilgenhurst & Associates.

In the crook, on the original resort room footprint, will go a full-height enclosed fire stair in the same white-sided vocabulary as the interstitial elements of the firm’s Fahey and McLane Halls, across the Mall. The building will also gain a west entrance with a portico.

[01.24.2007 link to fireplace note, other details added.]

The list of works of the firm of Lamb & Rich has been expanded to include several projects:

• House in Belle Haven Park, Greenwich, Conn.
• Cottage for Samuel Harris in North Long Branch, N.J.
• The Orange Club House, Brick Church, N.J.
• House for J.A. Minott, Orange, N.J.
• Bethel Presbyterian Church, Plainfield, N.J.
• Three houses on Sixth Avenue for H.M. Blasdell
• House on 68th Street for Anthony Mowbray
• Commercial Building at 37, 39 Greene Street
• Addition to 103-107 Prince Street for Edward Tuck and J.P. Townsend
• Washington Life Insurance Building
• Store at 24 East 22nd Street for W.H. Stern
• Store at 512-516 Broadway and 55-66 Crosby Street for William H. De Forest
• Addition to 7 Park Avenue for Charles P. Noyes
• Franklin Bank Competition Entry
• Unbuilt design for Brownell Hall, Barnard College

The architect of the Phi Delta Theta (now Phi Delta Alpha) house on Webster Avenue has been elusive. Although Alexander Anderson McKenzie “built into this house his own integrity,” as a plaque inside states, he did not design the building.

The American Architect and Building News stated in its “Building Intelligence” section for November 10, 1900:

The Dartmouth College Chapter of Phi Delta Theta fraternity will erect a chapter-house on Webster Ave., after plans by Charles A. Rich, 24 Nassau St., N.Y. City. The structure will be built in the Colonial style prevailing in the college buildings, the lines in general being similar to those of the Gov. Hancock House, Boston.

The Athletics website has an update on the Gym renovation. One of the photographs shows the upper drill hall, which the project will return to the industrial space it really is.

One of the first things the College did when it took over the Gym from the alumni was to add a central north stair to the eastern and western runs that already led to the main entrance. Now the school is replacing that narrow central run with a single broad main stair and substituting bicycle racks for the eastern run and a ramp for the western (see plan [pdf]). One expects that the ramp nevertheless will see the greatest use, since most people arrive from the west. The chunky cornerstone, laid by President Ernest Fox Nichols at his inauguration on October 14, 1909, may be obscured by the ramp.

Rosie Hughes writes of the team, mostly ex-Navy, that runs the Heating Plant.   The Romanesque building was built during 1898 and 1899 (designed by Rich) and expanded with a second level around 1940 (Larson).

Some interesting details from the west side of the Green–

Even though the escutcheon (not visible in this photo) at the top of the facade has an “M” for McNutt, the center of the balcony railing retains the “TH” for “Tuck Hall”:

Timothy J. McAuliffe, who had two sons attend the college, sculpted the lions and probably other details on the entrance portal of Robinson Hall:

The entrance vestibule of Parkhurst Hall has a tiled, domed ceiling that may use the popular Guastavino tile system often found in subway stations:

The Dartmouth reports that Hitchcock Hall will be renovated after the fall of 2006, a project that will probably include the installation of an elevator.

“Buildings and Projects” given its own page.

The Buildings and Projects of Lamb & Rich, Architects, and Related Firms, 1876-1935 updated.

This page given a Windows-friendlier color.
Update added to North Campus Master Plan.

“Rants” and “Topics” removed, as were pages describing individual buildings in Rich Appendix B, in preparation for better versions.

New version of the list of buildings and projects outside of Hanover designed by Charles Alonzo Rich available for download [.pdf].

[Update 01.22.2011: The Lamb & Rich list is available at the project site.]

A history of the original Beta Theta Pi House (Fairbanks South/Tucker Foundation) posted in Rich appendix. [Update: the information has since been removed.]

A history of the unexecuted Chemistry Laboratory posted in Rich appendix. [Update: the information has since been removed.]

A history of the unexecuted “Hillside” Dormitory posted in Rich appendix. [Update: the information has since been removed.]

A history of Robinson Hall posted in Rich appendix. [Update: the information has since been removed.]