Albee Hall

Name

Albee Hall was first named the Health and Physical Education Building when it opened in 1956.  It was renamed Albee Hall on April 29,1960.

Namesake: George Sumner Albee

Albee, the first president of the Oshkosh Normal School, served from 1871 until his death in 1898. While it is fitting to have named any building after Albee, there are two reasons why this particular building is most appropriate. First, he was an early supporter in physical education and activity, leading his staff and students in morning calisthenics every day for several years. Second, the building was built partly on the site of Albee’s home where he lived in during most of his Oshkosh years.

Facts

Completion Date: 1956; Dedicated on 22 May 1956

Cost: $850,000

Renovation Date: 1990-1992

Original Purpose of Building: The building housed a swimming pool, gymnasium (with seats for 2,000 spectators), locker rooms, offices for a student health unit and examination and infirmary rooms.

Current Use: Albee Hall contains a new swimming pool (completed in 1992 and opened in February of 1993), practice gymnasium, physical education offices and an multiuse gymnasium for games,  speakers, concerts and other large events.

History

Albee Hall’s construction was significant as it was the first educational facility built on campus since Swart Hall’s completion in 1928. Unlike the Radford Hall dormitory built in 1952, Albee Hall was built with state funds making it the first building of many to be built by state funds at the Oshkosh campus in response to the school’s expansion into liberal arts baccalaureate education. 

 In 1949, the Wisconsin legislature passed a bill that allowed schools to adopt liberal arts and pre-professional degrees and programs. By 1951, Oshkosh State Teachers College became Oshkosh State College, conferring degrees for the first time beyond teacher training. The new curriculum attracted men and women in greater numbers and a near constant increase in enrollment followed.  To make room for the students and facilities necessary for the new programs, a mass building expansion on campus began with the erection of Radford and Albee Halls.

Albee Hall was built to modernize the campus physical education facilities as the school's gymnasium was not sufficient for the growth of the school’s physical education and health programs as well as intramural and interscholastic athletics. Still, the building had its limitations known even before its completion. Upon a visit in 1955, the Director of the State Planning Commission commented that the facility had no space for outdoor activities.

Originally budgeted for $750,000, the incoming bids made it clear that another $100,000 would be needed to furnish and equip the building and monies were found in the balances of other state construction projects.

Albee Hall’s ground breaking was not an ordinary affair, Governor Walter Kohler came to Oshkosh for the event and numerous guests, both from the school and community, were on hand to witness the event.  Kohler used the ground breaking as an opportunity to discuss the major $14 million building program (part of a $93 million statewide program) the state colleges were enjoying. The Albee ground breaking was the first of five in the State Colleges System that year. The construction of the physical education building, Kohler stated, marked a rededication on the part of Wisconsin people to “preserve and strengthen one of the finest education systems in the United States.”

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