51视频

06/02/2020
By Ed Brennen

The听Francis College of Engineering听has launched countless careers since it was founded as the Lowell Textile School in 1895.

It also helped to launch a university 2,000 miles away in Lubbock, Texas.

In his recently published听book, 鈥淥pus in Brick and Stone: The Architectural and Planning Heritage of Texas Tech University,鈥� architect and author Brian Griggs reveals how Texas Tech鈥檚 roots became intertwined with 51视频 nearly a century ago.

鈥淭here鈥檚 a unique story in everything,鈥� says Griggs, whose book evolved from a proposal he wrote in 2009 for his architectural firm, Parkhill, Smith & Cooper, for a project at Texas Tech.

As Griggs discovered in his research, a delegation of administrators and architects from the newly created Texas Technical College visited Lowell in 1924 to learn as much as they could about the booming textile school located at Southwick Hall.

Per its charter, Texas Technical College鈥檚 curriculum was to include textile engineering. To understand what the college鈥檚 academic program should offer, as well as what its new building should look like, the delegation toured two of the most prominent textile schools of the day: Philadelphia Textile Institute and Lowell Textile School.

鈥淭here is strong evidence to support that the resulting Textile Engineering Building at Texas Tech was inspired by Southwick Hall,鈥� says Griggs, who notes that both buildings feature a sally port entry into a courtyard space, a 鈥渟quare donut鈥� plan configuration and similar spaces for machinery halls, wool carding and dye labs.

Texas Tech鈥檚 two-story building, which is now home to the school鈥檚 mechanical engineering department, ended up being about one-quarter the size of the four-story Southwick Hall.

鈥淚t wasn鈥檛 designed to match what the Lowell Textile School鈥檚 importance was to the huge mill industry that existed in Lowell at the time,鈥� says Griggs, who adds that Texas Tech didn鈥檛 plan on enrolling more than 6,000 students (today it has 38,000-plus students).

Southwick Hall is the cornerstone of UML鈥檚 North Campus. Opened in 1903, the yellow brick neoclassical structure was named for Royal Southwick, a Quaker abolitionist and state senator who established the Lowell Carpet Company. Southwick鈥檚 grandson, Frederick Ayer, was one of the primary benefactors of the Lowell Textile School, which originally opened on Middle Street in downtown Lowell in 1895. It became the Lowell Technical Institute in 1929.

One of Southwick Hall鈥檚 most distinctive features is the grand archway on its University Avenue fa莽ade. Griggs noted that the archway鈥檚 vaulted ceiling is clad in 鈥淕uastavino tile,鈥� named for Spanish engineer Rafael Guastavino, who brought his celebrated 鈥渢ile arch system鈥� to the United States in the late 1800s.听

鈥淚t鈥檚 a neat feature that鈥檚 kind of unusual,鈥� Griggs says of the tiles, which can also be found at the Boston Public Library, the Plymouth Rock portico and the Queensboro Bridge in New York.

The Texas Tech building, meanwhile, was done in a Spanish Revival style that its architect, William Ward Watkin, chose for the new college鈥檚 campus. Spanish Revival, which became popular in the Southwest in the early 20th century, features red tile roofs and long arcades of rounded arches.

Griggs, who has never been to Lowell, received research help from听Executive Director of Planning, Design and Construction听Adam Baacke听and Janine Whitcomb, special collections and archive manager for the听51视频 Library.

鈥淭exas Tech鈥檚 modeling of the Lowell Textile School was more than just the building,鈥� Baacke says. 鈥淵es, they copied the functional architecture of the building, but it also appears that they were looking at the Lowell Textile School as the model around which to craft their entire academic program in textile engineering.鈥�

And it helped to launch the careers of textile engineers 2,000 miles away from Lowell.