New Tuck School Plant

Announcement has been made from the President's office that at the recent meeting of the trustees of Dartmouth College plans had been approved for an impressive new and commodious plant for the Amos Tuck School of Administration and Finance, and that authorization had been given for the immediate erection of the group of buildings projected. This will consist of an imposing central structure for lectures, recitations, and conference rooms and offices, and two flanking residential buildings with living quarters for a hundred men. A refectory, likewise, will be attached.

The site will be on the side of Tuck Drive opposite to the President's house and somewhat to the west. The buildings will face south and on to a mall stretching from the west entrance of the Baker Library towards the Connecticut River. This group will mark a further and dominant development of the new west campus, in which two new dormitories of the College are being built at the present time, in addition to still another one and the new natural science hall which were both completed within this area last year.

No official statement was forthcoming in regard to estimated costs, but the attractiveness of design and the quality of work called for in the specifications of the new buildings indicate that in these the College will hold to the high standards of its recent construction policy. The assurance that the plan had the approval and the endorsement of Mr. Edward Tuck, the School's founder, would seem to indicate that again Dartmouth's most generous benefactor had at an opportune time promised his aid to the College in order that it might carry forward plans for increased accomplishment in its work. The greater proportion of Mr. Tuck's gifts have been for the general endowment funds of the College to be applied to instruction.

During recent years it has constantly become more evident that fullest development of the Tuck School program could be realized earlier than otherwise in a self-contained plant, which should be exclusively the home of the School, and in one which should be somewhat removed from the center of undergraduate life. It was believed that the new demands upon the Tuck School which sprang from its growing prestige and its wider recognition could be more completely met in a location where the School could develop an atmosphere of its own. Inevitably the work of a professional graduate school needs to be more sharply specialized than is prevailingly or desirably the method in undergraduate life in a liberal arts college.

Meanwhile, the administration proposal for taking over the present building of the Tuck School for general college purposes makes for a more unified plant and enlarged facilities for the undergraduate college, which now will command all sites about the historic campus with one exception.

J. Frederick Larson, resident architect for Dartmouth, described the architectural features of the proposed building as follows: "The architecture of the Tuck School group is in keeping with the traditional architecture of the College and it interprets in the grouping of the new plant its individual character as a complete unit. The plans call for buildings of Georgian inspiration adapted to harmonize with other Dartmouth architecture. With the beautiful spruces and pines along Tuck Drive in which the buildings are to be set, there will be provided a natural background and an immediate landscape beauty to the group."

William R. Gray, dean of the Tuck School and trustee of the College, has interpreted the plans for the new business school plant. The central building houses a large lecture room in the rear wing of the ground floor. The space in the main part of this floor is assigned to offices and conference rooms. Facilities for a management laboratory and space for storage are also provided here.

The entrance to the main floor is through a colonnade to a vestibule which opens into a spacious lobby. From this open the administrative offices which occupy the whole of the rear wing on this floor. A lateral hallway extending through the main part of the building is flanked by a large room for the use of the faculty and by thirteen faculty offices. Stairways leading to the ground or basement floor and to the second floor open on one side of the entrance vestibule.

The second floor is given over to a library, a research study room, the librarian's office, and five class rooms.

The third floor provides for an accounting and statistical laboratory and here will be located the headquarters for the committee on research. A room for computing apparatus connects with both of these rooms. There are also three offices on this floor. Adequate toilet facilities are provided on each floor of the building.

The two residential buildings are connected with the main building by arcades, one at the east end and another at the west end of the central structure. These buildings are planned alike to provide suites mostly for two men each. A few are for three men and there are three single rooms on each floor. There will be fireplaces provided in several of the larger suites on each floor. The residential houses will provide handball and squash facilities in the basement levels.

The refectory with accommodations for approximately 100 men will be located at the west and north of the west residential building and will be connected with the other buildings through hallways and arcades which form the main lateral axis of the group.

The new Tuck School group has been planned with a view to the maintenance of a limited enrollment based on the traditionally selective standards of admission which have always prevailed in the School.