The stone, brick and concrete building known today as Old Main was dedicated in January 1909; the cost of construction totaled $195,587. It was lighted with both gas and electricity, and in addition to classrooms featured a library, laboratories and a gymnasium with a suspended running track. Sports fields and flower and vegetable gardens surrounded the structure. The north wing, including the auditorium named today after realtor Julien J. Studley, was a later addition completed in 1920. It wasn’t until 1930 that the Normal School began to expand its footprint with the construction of the van den Berg School of Practice, later called the Campus School, where student teachers got their practical training; and it wasn’t until the 1940s that the Normal School was accredited as a State Teachers’ College and the campus as we now know it began to unfold.
The north wing is scheduled for completion sometime this fall, at which point the whole building will have a rededication ceremony.
However sturdily constructed, a building that enjoys (or endures) heavy use for over a century eventually gets to a point where it needs to be renovated. OMB has had upgrades over the decades, of course, including more modern electrical wiring, fire abatement modifications and thermopane windows to provide better insulation. But by three years ago, a lot of work needed to be done, including accessibility adaptations to comply with the Americans with Disabilities Act. Much of the south wing facilities had not been used since 1964, when the Elting Gymnasium was built. (During this correspondent’s own student years at SUNY-New Paltz in the 1970s, rumors abounded of a “secret passage” on the unused third floor above the old gym, accessible by catwalks from the elevated track.)
In the most radical change to the building during the recent renovation process, all of that former gymnasium area has been gutted. If you go in through the main entrance facing the Old Quad, you’ll quickly find yourself in a softly lit pale-blue-and-grey elevator lobby with a brand-new dropped ceiling of acoustical tiles. The floor looks like the same old mid-20th-century institutional tile that was there before, until you turn left into the refurbished hallway, which has beautiful new oak flooring — a restoration of an original building feature, according to John F. McEnrue, director of Facilities Design & Construction for the project. New faculty office suites and conference rooms have appeared where the gym used to be; and when you reach the southeast corner and turn west, you’ll barely recognize the place. Thick new carpeting conveys a hush and the look of a modern hotel corridor.
Other areas of OMB are a mix of old and new building elements. While upgrading the facilities with a variety of green features to attain Leadership in Energy and Environments Design (LEED) Silver Certification, the designers also strove to preserve some of the quaint historic details that distinguish the structure. The various stained-glass windows are being cleaned up and structurally reinforced but left in place. In the stairwells, the wrought-iron railings have been preserved and some of the oak handrails replaced; the black marble steps of the staircases are still a bit concave, attesting to wear by the feet of generations of students. Ugly institutional fluorescent fixtures have been replaced throughout the building with pendant lamps that look more like the building’s original lighting while conserving energy.
As you wander about and peer through the doors of the classrooms — which will continue to be devoted to the School of Education — you’ll notice that their furnishings have been modernized, but the story-high banks of windows still let in plenty of natural light. There are several new computer labs. Typewritten checklists taped to the classroom and office doors show what details still need to be completed in each room. The overall effect is a bit of a hodgepodge: neither a slick total modernization nor an entirely authentic historic renovation project.
