Buildings give history lesson

Sheri McWhirter
Photography Editor

The observant SIUE student will notice that building names on campus can sometimes cause confusion with pronunciation. That is because the good majority were named for people who have impacted the university in some way.

Lovejoy Library is named in honor of Elijah Parish Lovejoy, a clergyman and newspaper publisher in the area. Lovejoy edited a newspaper in St. Louis and moved it to Alton. Lovejoy's anti-slavery views published in his paper made him incredibly unpopular in the area. He was so unpopular that angry mobs threw his printing press into the Mississippi River on more than one occasion.

However, Lovejoy never faltered and he kept printing his views on slavery. It was this persistence that got him murdered by another angry mob on Nov. 7, 1837. After killing Lovejoy, the mob threw his fourth printing press into the river.

Katherine Dunham Hall is the home of the theater, mass communications and music departments. Dunham is a famous dancer and choreographer who has lived in East St. Louis for numerous years. She has been affiliated with SIUE for many of those years.

Dunham's most successful contribution to our university was starting the Performing Arts Training Center at the East St. Louis campus. SIUE renamed the Communications Building as Katherine Dunham Hall in honor of her achievements. Dunham still resides in East St. Louis.

The University Center was renamed the Morris University Center not too long ago in honor of SIUE's founding president, Delyte Morris. According to Stephen Kerber, SIUE's archivist and Special Collections librarian, Morris "accelerated the offering of classes in this area."

Before SIUE was here, SIUC offered some courses in Belleville, but Morris helped organize the SIUC Residence Centers in Alton and East St. Louis in 1957, which were well received by the communities. The Residence Centers were so popular that in 1960 a statewide bond issue to support public universities was passed. The bond helped pay for SIUE and the University of Illinois in Chicago.

Rendleman Hall is named for the president that followed Morris in 1970, John Rendleman. When Rendleman became president, SIUE was made autonomous from SIUC. "Rendleman remained president until 1976, when he died of cancer," Kerber said.

John Mason Peck, for whom Peck Hall is named, was a clergyman who started a secondary school in St. Clair County at Rock Spring. The Baptist college eventually moved to Alton and was known as Shurtleff College.

Unfortunately the college went under in 1957 because of financial problems. At that time SIUE leased and finally purchased the Shurtleff College property. Today, the Dental School uses the space.

Peck Hall was the first classroom building at SIUE and it was named for Peck because he "was responsible for starting the first institution of higher education in Southwestern Illinois," Kerber said.

The Vadalabene Center is named for the man responsible for it's existence. Sam Vadalabene was an Illinois state senator who was a "great friend and supporter of the university," Kerber said. Vadalabene successfully pushed for funding of a fitness center at SIUE in the Illinois Senate.

Korte Stadium is named for Ralph Korte, a local construction businessman. Korte is a strong financial supporter of SIUE and was an early graduate. "I even think he was a graduate of the Residence Center," Kerber said.

Alumni and Founders halls got their names in a rather different way. "Dr. Werner decided a few years ago that those buildings had gone nameless too long," Kerber said. So the buildings were named to honor the people who solicited and accepted donations to start SIUE and the students who pass through it.