Clow Social Science Center and Faculty Building

Name

Namesake: Frederick R. Clow

Clow, a Harvard-educated faculty member from 1895-1930, taught economics and political science as well as education psychology.

Facts

Completion Date: 1966

Cost: $2.49 million

Renovation Date: 2014-2016 ($28.3 million)

Original Purpose of Building: Originally housed offices for various Social Science Departments, classrooms, laboratories, an audio-visual center and a television studio.

Current Use: Same including computer labs.

History

Fifteen years after its expansion into liberal arts, the Oshkosh State University was suffering from a great lack of space for instruction and faculty offices. The Clow complex (an instruction facility and office building) almost doubled the number of classrooms on campus. The building’s unique clover-leaf lecture halls provided state-of-the-art communication technology to the campus of 7,000+ students. The tall Clow Faculty building also provided much needed space for departmental offices. In addition, Clow was the home to the University's first television studio. A museum on the top floor provided a return to the display of natural and indigenous history specimens and artifacts that did not exist on campus since 1916. Like that collection, the Clow Museum was destroyed in a fire in 1983.

In 2014-2016, the Clow complex underwent a substantial renovation that brought the College of Nursing into the building with its specialized classrooms, laboratories and communal spaces. This was made possible after the departure of many departments to the new Sage Hall across the street.