Most wise and sagacious seems to me the determination not to build
for the present. It has been my fate to see great educational funds
fossilise into mere bricks and mortar, in the petrifying springs of
architecture, with nothing left to work the institution they were
intended to support. A great warrior is said to have made a desert and
called it peace. Administrators of educational funds have sometimes made
a palace and called it a university. If I may venture to give advice in
a matter which lies out of my proper competency, I would say that
whenever you do build, get an honest bricklayer, and make him build you
just such rooms as you really want, leaving ample space for expansion.
And a century hence, when the Baltimore and Ohio shares are at one
thousand premium, and you have endowed all the professors you need, and
built all the laboratories that are wanted, and have the best museum and
the finest library that can be imagined; then, if you have a few hundred
thousand dollars you don't know what to do with, send for an architect
and tell him to put up a facade. If American is similar to English
experience, any other course will probably lead you into having some
stately structure, good for your architect's fame, but not in the least
what you want.
Pages:
100
101
102
103
104
105
106
107
108
109
110
111
112
113
114
115
116
117
118
119
120
121
122
123
124