| History
"Kentuckians need to know Kentucky." From this simple
understanding came the Kentucky Building, a unique public resource
on the campus of Western Kentucky University.
In the early 1920s, Western faculty member Gabrielle Robertson was
in search of books to assist her Kentucky history students. When
she visited the college library, however, she found only one. She
began to collect books and other material on Kentucky and place
them in a special room in the library. Assisting her were Frances
Richards, who taught Kentucky literature, and librarian Florence
Ragland.
At the same time Western's first president, Henry Hardin Cherry,
conceived a plan for the Kentucky Building. Hoping for support from
the General Assembly, he set out his vision in the form of a draft
appropriations bill. For Western students, the building would constitute
a center for the study and teaching of the state's history, geography,
literature, people and culture. For the public, it would serve as
a permanent repository for documents and artifacts that might otherwise
be lost, "an ideal environment for the promulgation of the
story of Kentucky's life." By 1928, Cherry believed that a
building could be realized with private contributions and announced
a $300,000 capital campaign. While one-third of the money would
be used to create a revolving student loan fund, the remaining two-thirds
were to be allocated to construction of the Kentucky Building. Louisville
architect Brinton B. Davis began work on plans for a 40,000-square-foot,
Georgian-Revival style structure that would include reception areas,
classrooms, museum galleries and library reading rooms.
When construction began in spring 1931, nearly $200,000 had been
pledged by enthusiastic Western students, faculty, alumni and friends.
Unfortunately, only the exterior shell of the building could be
completed before exhaustion of funds and the onset of the Depression
brought the project to a halt. As the Kentucky Library and Museum
collections grew to fill several rooms of Western's library, the
half-finished Kentucky Building provided little more than temporary
classroom space. Although he launched a second fundraising campaign
in fall 1935, President Cherry died in 1937 without seeing the building
serve its true purpose.
Cherry's successor, President Paul Garrett, renewed the search for
funds to complete the building. Securing a combination of private
and public support, including a grant from the Public Works Administration,
Garrett hired architect James M. Ingram to complete the interior.
The Kentucky Building finally opened in fall 1939. At the dedication
ceremonies on November 16, Henry Hardin Cherry's birthday, librarian
Mary T. Moore pronounced the Kentucky Building "ready to begin
its service to the citizens of this state and other states. Students
and research workers may come here to delve deep into the story
of Kentucky."
Over the years, the staff of the Kentucky Building continued to
enlarge its collections. Following a three-year, two-million-dollar
renovation and expansion project to provide more room for its thousands
of books, manuscripts, photographs, newspapers, museum artifacts,
genealogical material, audiotapes and videotapes, the building formally
reopened on July 4, 1980.
Today, the Kentucky Building houses the Kentucky Museum, Kentucky
Library, Manuscripts and Folklife Archives, and Western's University
Archives
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