The public is invited to an open house at Michigan State University to view and provide input on a site plan designed to commemorate Morrill Hall, which was MSU’s first women’s dormitory.
The open house is from noon to 4 p.m. Friday, Oct. 12, on the second floor of the MSU Union.
The concept under consideration was designed by students in MSU’s landscape architecture program and was the winner of a design charrette in which a number of teams submitted plans. The plan includes a simple walkway reflecting the location of the building’s actual hallway.
Two refined versions of the site plan and historical photos will be on display.
More than 100 years old, Morrill Hall is scheduled to be demolished in the spring of 2013. Close monitoring of the internal wooden structure of the building revealed irreparable deterioration and it was determined that reconstruction and restoration would not be feasible.
The building was originally named the Women’s Building. In 1937 it was re-named in honor of Justin Morrill for whom the Morrill Act is named. It was the Morrill Act, signed in 1862 by President Abraham Lincoln, that brought about the establishment of the land-grant university.