Slichter Hall

Building Description

Built in 1946 Slichter Hall provided permanent dormitory space for a greatly increased post WW II student body. It is named for Professor Charles Sumner Slichter, a long time and much beloved professor of mathematics, and initiator of the dormitory house-fellow system. Like all the lake-shore dormitories, Slichter hall is a highly desirable place to live and is constantly filled. In 1952 in preparation for the demolition of old Chadbourne Hall, Slichter was assigned as a hall for women students. As part of the Van Hise group it is without dining facilities, students taking their board at the Van Hise (later Carson Gulley) commons.

History

During early 1946, the division of residence halls consulted with the state architect Roger
Kirchhoff, to plan the new dormitory. They collected suggestions from the house-fellows and residents of the Van Hise and newer Kronshage dormitories. By late summer of 1946, the plans were ready. The regents approved the plans and authorized the contracts. The contractor was the George A. Fuller Company of Chicago.

Ground was broken in the fall of 1946, in the hope that the dormitory could be finished in time for the fall semester of 1947. This very aggressive schedule was nearly though not quite met. Severe weather in the winter of 1946, the contractor's simultaneous work on University Houses, and postwar material shortages caused minor slippage, all the while business manager A. W. Peterson nipping at the contractor's heels. By November of 1947, after the job was supposed to be done, the house fellows and some residents were living in the old sheep barn, previously used as the short course dorm, while the contractors finished up the first floor intended for use as the offices of the division of residence halls, who were then located in Chadbourne Hall. The regents authorized another $50,000 for the project to cover material overruns.

The finished building was four stories and a basement, shaped like a '[' with the short wings projecting to the east, of brick construction with concrete floors. The exterior sheathing was lannonstone, the material first used in Liz Waters, and in the short course dorms. The classic Madison sandstone last used in the Kronshage dorms was no longer available. The building was divided into four houses, Bierman, Gavin, Goldberg, and Luedke, first through fourth floors respectively. These were all university men who died in WW II.