buildingshsu

Building a Mystery: LSC Bookstore

2012-06-08T21:14:00.000-05:00

We received an email this week from someone seeking information about the Lowman Student Center (LSC) bookstore, specifically ownership:

I am trying to find information about the bookstore companies that ran the LSC bookstore on campus from 1991 to 1998; I was employed there during part of that time. My memory is foggy, so I have been turning to other resources but so far nobody has record or recollection of the owners/management prior to the current store, which is run by Barnes and Noble.

By our estimation Barnes and Noble has operated the University Bookstore since c.2004. A temporary B&N store stood on the site of the current Chemistry and Forensic Sciences Building c.2003, possibly during and after the interior remodeling of the LSC last decade. Anyway:

I know that Follett was running the bookstore during part of my time there, but I cannot recall if they were the earlier company, or the one that took it over. Follett has no record, having purged all records. I am also pretty sure that the university itself ran the bookstore at one point, and staff was under SHSU payroll. It was not when I worked there, though. Still I know there was a change, because I worked for two companies during my employment and I helped with a changeover, and we had to inventory everything. There was then a clearance of most non-book items, as the new managing company did not want to take on too much inventory. I think the books went back to an outside distribution point. Then the store was emptied of all fixtures, etc. A new company came in and built their layout from scratch.

And there’s where things stand today.

If anyone has any memories of the LSC bookstore – be it any owner, be it any time period, or even be it about that thick, red paperback English Composition I book with a pseudo-engraving of Austin Hall on its cover that, for Fall 1994, was a required purchase but (ahem) was bought back at the end of the semester for mere peanuts because the English Department wasn’t going to use it any longer – and wants to help out a fellow Bearkat, drop us a line. She’d be glad to hear from you.

And I’d personally like to see the cover of that English comp book again, too.

Building a Mystery: Home Management Home

2012-01-15T01:00:00.000-06:00

One thing about going further back in time through the yearbooks is that the locations of certain buildings are somewhat ambiguous.
Take for example the Home Management House, as shown in the 1941 Alcalde. This is most likely one of the many homes that surrounded the campus in the early-to-mid 20th Century – maybe once a boarding house for SHNI students that was later used as a demonstration home for research and educational purposes. As the campus grew whole neighborhoods of homes like this were leveled to make way for academic buildings, dormitories, pedestrian malls, green spaces, and even sometimes parking lots.

Where was this house located? Ken Hestand (’57) dropped us a line with some ideas:

My wife remembers that the Home Management House was near what was called the Annex, but doesn’t remember exactly where. On the east side of the Avenue J and facing the President's House was a two story house that was called the Annex. My wife roomed there. I believe it was also used as a demonstration house for home economics majors who had to live there for a semester, to plan and cook meals. One requirement was to have sweetbreads at least once a week. They also kept house, etc. as a normal housewife would do. From your map, the Annex was where the Post Office/Telephone Service Building was.

Yum - sweetbreads! So perhaps this house once sat south of where the LSC now stands? Any other thoughts?

Building a Mystery: Nutria House

2010-08-02T09:42:00.001-05:00

We’re curious if anyone has any memories of the Nutria House (perhaps officially known to some as the Animal Sciences Lab) that appears to have existed as part of the Horticulture Center off College Farm Road (Avenue M). There’s mention of it in the Campus Master Plan that was published in 1982 and we’ve come across one photograph of a grayish metal structure labeled "Nutria"; the building looks to be on its last leg and probably was razed shortly thereafter.

Building a Mystery: Catholic Student Center

2009-09-06T16:27:00.002-05:00

Periodically we come across shards of uncertainty in our research. Today it's the Catholic Student Center (CSC).

First, the building, located west of main campus on 17th Street, is not owned by the university. Seeing how it's one of those close-by structures (and that it appeared on past campus maps) we decided to do some research into it. What we found was a number of interchangeable names.

The 1982 Alcalde notes the construction of a new Catholic student center called Morkovsky Hall. No location is given but we assume it's the building along 17th Street; our maps dated before the 1980s indicate nothing at that location so we feel safe that they are one in the same. Who was Morkovsky? No immediate clue unless it was John Morkovsky (1909-1990), the bishop of the Catholic Diocese of Galveston-Houston - who would have still been alive in 1982. And don't tell us that's the wrong Morkovsky because we'll then have headaches and be all cross.

We're not sure how official the "Morkovsky" name was, however, because campus maps from the mid-1980s identify the structure as the Newman Foundation. Many Catholic student centers across the country - indeed, the world - are labeled "Newman," named for John Henry Newman (1801-1890) who maintained the idea that "Catholic students attending public universities should have a place to gather where they would be able to support and encourage one another in their faith."

Hereafter the name of the building flip-flops from "Newman Foundation" to “Newman Student Center” to “St. Thomas Catholic Student Center” and finally to, what signage currently out front says, "Catholic Student Center." Saint Thomas? Yes, have no doubts, St. Thomas the Apostle Catholic Church sits just north of the student center, facing 16th Street.

We've forwarded a few emails to the CSC but to date have heard nothing in return. That leaves it to our readers at large: does anyone have information on the history of the Catholic Student Center or other Catholic student organizations on campus?