Special Collections Featured Images
Then & Now: first installment
We’re excited to launch a new series on our blog titled: Then & Now. This series will highlight historic images, mainly from the University Archives Photographs, alongside current views of the same location. We’re grateful to Tim Silva, the Library’s Illustrator and Exhibits Specialist, for his graphic work on the project as well as his photography of the present day sites.
Our first installment features a building quite close to Shields Library. This image is a give away since the name of the building can be seen in the photograph. The Animal Sciences Building was completed in June 1928 at a cost of $256,879. It was designed in the Spanish Revival style by William Charles Hays (1873-1963), Professor of Architecture at UC Berkeley and also Supervising Architect for the Davis campus.
When the building was completed in 1928, it housed the Animal Husbandry Department as well as the divisions of Veterinary Science, Entomology, and Zoology. In 1949, Veterinary Science moved to the new Haring Hall. Entomology stayed in the building until 1948-1949 and Zoology until 1969.
The building was renamed George Hart Hall in 1983. Hart’s career at the University of California began in 1917 when he joined the faculty at Berkeley as Professor of Veterinary Science. He came to Davis in 1926 as Professor of Animal Husbandry and Chairman of the Department, a position he held until 1948, when he became Dean of the School of Veterinary Medicine. He retired in 1954.
In 1986, Hart Hall was listed in the National Register of Historic Places. In 1987, the Animal Sciences Department moved to the new James Meyer Hall and Hart Hall underwent a renovation which was completed in 1992.
Today Hart Hall houses the following departments, programs, and organizations: African American and African Studies, American Studies, Asian American Studies, Center for Transnational Health, Chicana/o Studies, C.N. Gorman Museum, Cultural Studies, Human & Community Development, Native American Studies, and Women Studies.
Feel free to submit a guess of the date of the “then” photo and/or note any differences in the two images via the comments below.
Stay tuned for our next installment of Then & Now...
