Begun last year, a facilities project with a powerful resonance for ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ people — a resonance both historic and literal — was completed last week.

Since July 30, a new mechanism has been tolling the noon hour every day on the venerable Hathorn Hall bell. The new striker whacks the outside of the 167-year-old bell, in contrast to the old-school electric mechanism it replaced, which sounded the bell by swinging it so that a clapper would strike the inside. (Still earlier, students were hired to live in Hathorn and ring the bell.)

The road to the replacement was long, involving considerable work to improve access to and conditions within Hathorn’s attic and belfry. (And replacement of HVAC machinery in the attic coincided with the bell work.) The last steps needed in the run-up to the striker, says Alan Kelley, ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½â€™ manager of mechanical and electrical services, promoted “safe access to the actual bellâ€� — improvements to the belfry ladders and creation of a tie-off point for fall protection.

The striker was fabricated by Elderhorst Bells of Palm, Pa. ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ electricians installed it, with assistance from clock expert Peter Rioux of Winterport, Maine. Rioux, says Kelley, helped position “the new striker and set up the new bell controller.â€� (The striker controls are located elsewhere in Hathorn.)

Kelley adds that a smartphone app will eventually become an additional means of operating the bell. “Information and Library Services is figuring out the needed network configuration and level of security for this feature. We’re also purchasing a remote control that can be used to manually control the bell for special occasions.�

Don’t fence us out: Walking up Campus Avenue last week, we were pleased to see the latest addition to ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½â€™ fleet of student residences — literally pleased to see it, because the fence that had largely hidden construction activities at 96 Campus Avenue from passers-by was gone.

Built as a Sisters of Charity convent in 1977 and later given over to offices, 96 Campus Avenue has spent much of 2024 becoming ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½â€™ newest student residence. The fence that wasn’t there last week is just one of several outward signs that the building’s transformation is near its end.

What else? There are many fewer people at work there (and therefore fewer vehicles). The parking lot has been paved and striped and its signage installed.

The installation of new windows and other glasswork, which has been the project team’s top priority for the last few weeks, is all but done. All the metal-and-glass “storefrontâ€� units are in place, but window trim is still being fitted and painted, and seams being caulked, both inside and out. 

Perhaps the most important markers of progress, though, aren’t obvious: A formal inspection by the city of Lewiston scheduled for Aug. 9 is expected to lead to ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½â€™ certificate of occupancy, allowing the college to start using the building. “The big push (these days) is to get ready for that,â€� ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ project manager Brian Lanoie told us during our July 30 visit.

In a month this newly refurbished third-floor corridor in 96 Campus Avenue will be busy with student residents. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

Used at 96 Campus Avenue for window trim and other purposes, Azek is a manufactured building material. The brand name is printed on a protective film that will be peeled off prior to painting. The trees are part of the view from the eastern side of the building. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

New washers for student use at 96 Campus Avenue. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

The mechanical room at 96 Campus Avenue. From left, features include sanitary discharge, water intakes for fire suppression and domestic water, and two gray heaters for domestic hot water. The wheeled contraption is used for bending electrical conduits. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

A splash of daylight on new carpeting in a second-floor seating area at 96 Campus Avenue. The blue material will be rolled out to protect the new carpet from incidental damage. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

Around the same time, in a similar vein, the company that has managed the project for ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ will return formal control of 96 Campus Avenue to the college. In a contractual action known as “substantial completion,â€� this is when ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ and Consigli Construction, which has partnered with the college on major construction projects dating back at least to 2006, mutually declare that the building is ready for its intended use.

As Campus Construction Update likes to remind you, since we are continually rediscovering it ourselves, things lead to other things. In the category of formal inspections, for instance, Lanoie noted that city approval of all the above-ceiling electrical work was attained on July 29. (Not to be confused with “the above ceiling electrical work,� as we hadn’t mentioned any yet.)

That gave the ceiling installers the green light to install the rest of the drop-ceiling tiles on the first floor, a process known in the trade as “flooding.� (This strikes us as a much neater way to flood a ceiling than some we have tried. But we won’t comment on the logic of calling something “drop� that is placed above one’s head. Unless you have flooded the ceiling with water, in which case it could also be called a “drip ceiling.�)

Meanwhile, punch-listing is well underway. Not to be mistaken for a key step in summer-party planning, this is a conclusive round of detailed construction inspections and consequent repairs. Engineers from the firm that designed the 96 Campus Avenue conversion, Lavallee | Brensinger Architects, began that process in mid-July.

Also in train is commissioning, the protocol of testing and adjusting major systems such as HVAC and domestic water heating. Like punch-listing, commissioning starts late in a construction project, but differs in that it can stretch out into months. That’s because demands on machinery change as the seasons change. 

On top of all that, beds and mattresses arrived and were installed on Aug. 5, and all of the lounge furniture two days later. New England Woodcraft of Forest Dale, Vt., is providing student-room furniture aside from mattresses, which come from Bourdon’s Institutional Sales of Claremont, N.H. Based in Portland, Creative Office Resources is outfitting the lounge areas at 96 Campus Avenue.

Lanoie explained during our tour that ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ Residence Life staff and the project architects took the lead in selecting styles and colors for the new furniture. “We typically give the design team as much creativity as they want,â€� Lanoie said — but he and Res Life folks also examined furnishings already in use around campus, as well as visiting the Creative Office Resources showroom. 

“You’ll see some pieces that are similar to what you see in other ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ residence halls,â€� he said. “Certainly the fabrics will be different, more in line with the color scheme of the building.â€�

Finally, Lanoie informed us that Facility Services tradespeople have started training on technical systems at the new dorm — so-called owner training. Training on mechanical and sprinkler systems took place in mid-July and plumbing training at the beginning of this month.

“So that’s good. That’s a sign that we’re getting close� to completion, Lanoie said.

He added, “The ping-pong table arrives on Aug. 8.�

Get the LED in: When we swung by Russell Street Field on July 30, a few workers and fewer machines were tending to the subgrade recently placed in the oval expanse inside the track. The team from Shaw Brothers, a prominent earthworks firm based in Gorham, Maine, were finalizing the depth, contours, and other details of the gray crushed stone that constitutes the subgrade.

All this was in preparation for installation of a new synthetic playing surface, a composition of plastic grass, sand, and rubber crumbs that will replace the living grass that had failed to thrive there after its placement in 2019. That replacement will not only provide a durable surface but also vastly expand the field’s availability and its use beyond soccer.

But the CORE field turf, a product line manufactured in Georgia by the field turf manufacturer FieldTurf, won’t appear quite yet. This week a concrete curb is being poured around the outside of the oval. Strips of wood, so-called nailers, will be attached to this curb, and the turf will be nailed to the nailers. (The circularity, or perhaps ovality, of this description boggles the mind.)

The nails attaching the turf will be stainless steel and there will be about 1,320 of them, driven around the field’s quarter-mile circumference at the rate of one per foot, says Paul Farnsworth, ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ project manager for the project. 

Men and machines prepare the crushed-stone subgrade at Russell Street Field. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

A Shaw Bros. team works on the crushed stone subgrade at Russell Street Field in preparation for the placement of artificial turf. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

An excavator loads dirt and sod into a dump truck for disposal at Russell Street Field as the replacement of natural grass with artificial turf gets underway on July 15. Some of the dirt will be sifted and reused in landscaping elsewhere on the site. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

On July 15, a Shaw Bros. excavator scrapes up the natural turf laid at Russell Street Field back in 2019. A manufactured surface will replace the grass. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

The yellow gizmos topping the masts on this Shaw Bros. bulldozer are transceivers for the GPS system that guides the operator at Russell Street Field. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

Shown in mid-July, this wood-and-steel ramp enabled heavy equipment to cross into the Russell Street Field work zone without damaging the track surface, which is just a couple years old. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

After the curb and nailers are in place, some minor electrical work will have to be done, Farnsworth added. “And then it’s a last check on the grading before they call in the turf field people.�

Those people are scheduled to get to work during the last week of August.

In the meantime, though, installation of new field lights has begun. This week foundation holes for two of the four Musco-brand lights were dug on the bleachers side of the field. The foundations, 8-foot-long precast concrete tubes, will be planted next, followed by the setting-up of poles and lights. Two more lights will be installed on the Russell Street side. 

ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ has been using Musco lights for years, with arrays around Garcelon and Campus Avenue fields. But the new lights will be LED, as opposed to the metal halide lamps in use at Garcelon and Campus Avenue. (Metal halide lamps, like the more familiar mercury vapor units, use high-intensity gas discharge technology. Metal halide units are long-lasting and at least 10 times more efficient than incandescent bulbs, according to the U.S. Department of Energy, but LED still beats ’em both.) 

Can we talk? Campus Construction Update loves to hear from you. Please send questions, comments, reminiscences, and inflammatory speculation about construction at ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College to dhubley@bates.edu, with “Campus Constructionâ€� or “What kind of punch tastes good with a knuckle sandwich?â€� in the subject line.

Garry Jenkins told a gathering on Sept. 7 that he has noticed a frequent theme in chatting with members of the college community: their warm feelings for 104-year-old Chase Hall. 

“They tell me about special, unforgettable moments that happened here,â€� Jenkins, president of ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ since July, said to a crowd celebrating the building’s re-opening after an in-depth renovation that began last year. 

Former students recall sharing meals in Chase with friends, attending dances and club meetings, and enjoying casual encounters while checking their post-office boxes, Jenkins said. And even as longtime services were relocated from Chase in recent years, leaving students fewer reasons to visit, there was “still something about Chase that made it part of the beating heart of this campus,� he said.

“Now, after 14 months of renovation and rejuvenation, it’s absolutely fantastic [and] ready to bring students and faculty back — throwing open the doors, welcoming people in, ready to be relevant.�

Restoring the relevance of Chase was high on the list as the long-planned renovation tackled a variety of goals: consolidating Student Affairs staff and functions in a handy location, improving physical access to the building, making wayfinding easier, and brightening and opening up spaces once dim and confined.

Moreover, in keeping with other recent building projects at ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½, Chase gained not only new spaces for students to study, meet, or zone out, but a wild diversity of configurations and appointments for those spaces. Even the former Dining Services loading dock, now considered part of a plaza that faces Muskie Archives, has been transformed into a place to take one’s ease.

There are �one million interesting, comfortable nooks and crannies where you can hide out if you need to make a call, review your notes, or have a mindful few minutes,� estimated another speaker at the reopening, Allen Delong, senior associate dean for Purposeful Work and one of the building’s new inhabitants.

“It’s my hope for each of us that we get to know the timeless, beautiful multi-use spaces like Hirasawa and Skelton lounges, and the lovely little quirky ones that you’ll discover on your own,� Delong said to students at the reopening. “Over the years, alumni have made great memories in this building, and starting today you should, too.�

The ceremony took place in the Chase Hall courtyard in a dreamlike haze of angled sun and temps nudging 90. Also speaking was Geoff Swift, ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ vice president for finance and administration and treasurer, who joined Jenkins in thanking the parties who helped bring the renovation to a successful conclusion — including Pam Wichroski, retired head of capital planning and construction, who was an early advocate for the project.

Student government Co-President Dhruv Chandra ’25 helped Jenkins and Swift cut the wide garnet ribbon to end the re-opening formalities, whereupon some 250 folks attending the event made for the refreshment tables or entered Chase for a look around. 

Wrapping up: The city of Lewiston issued a certificate of occupancy for Chase on Aug. 25, and staff representing six Student Affairs functions moved in during the last four days of August. (Those functions are Campus Life, Community Standards, Dean of Students, Intercultural Education, Purposeful Work, and Residence Life & Health Education.)

With construction still in progress — because of final repairs from the July rainstorm that drove water into ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ buildings including Chase — the move-in was “crazy,â€� said Paul Farnsworth, senior project manager for ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ Facility Services. “But par for the course.â€� 

“It was challenging, as renovation projects are,� said project manager Kristi Mynhier. “You never know what to expect, and this has been no different. But altogether we had the right team on board� — including the college’s project management staff, construction management firm Consigli Construction, and the architect, Canal Five Studio of Portland, Maine.

“We all worked together as a team and never lost sight of that.�

A few construction chores are still going on, primarily testing new building systems and closing out defects found during the punch-list inspections. 

We took our own look around an hour before the ribbon-cutting. We parked our chassis briefly at the inviting, elevated first-floor scenic viewpoint known as the Overnook, oohed and aahed at lots of colorful furniture, scampered up and down the Central Stair like innocent tots, and admired the expanded, glass-walled reception area for the Office of Intercultural Education.

The carpeting was nice in the Central Stair (and color-coded so you’ll know what level you’re on) and we liked the old-meets-new aesthetic created there by bare brick, glossy wood, and stainless-steel handrails. We also appreciated the bright new finishes applied to portions of Chase otherwise not involved in the renovation, such as the stairway and passage from the lobby to Memorial Commons, and the venerable second-floor Skelton and Hirasawa lounges.

Chase was mostly quiet for our inspection. We encountered only a lost student late for an appointment, a carpenter fitting wooden doors on the second floor, a few alumni happily agog at the building’s look and layout, and Chris Streifel, director of capital projects, at work on his laptop and enjoying the view from the Res Life reception area.

An exception to the tranquillity was in the Center for Purposeful Work, on the first floor, where Delong and other staff were abuzz with the excitement of their attractive new digs. Hoi Ning Ngai, director of employer engagement and business advising, gave us a quick tour. “I love the light,â€� she said — PW’s corner suite basks in southern sun that pours in through expanses of glass, including the new “lightwell,â€� a staircase-turned-atrium at the main Campus Avenue entrance. 

Ngai pointed out newly showcased features of the old building’s original architecture, such as prominent wooden trusses that help keep the whole works standing. And she explained that the office culture in Purposeful Work is dynamic. Only Delong and Sheila Anderson, director of operations, marketing and outreach, have permanently assigned offices, while everyone else floats, supported by such apparatus as unobtrusive employee lockers and rewriteable name plaques next to office doors.

Seems like a fitting example for students preparing for post-graduation workplaces much changed from even a few years ago. 

Folks attending the Sept. 7 reopening of Chase Hall look and listen as President Garry Jenkins offers remarks prior to the ribbon-cutting. (Phyllis Graber Jensen/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

Seen from the Kenison Gate, this image of Chase Hall was taken an hour or so prior to its re-opening ceremony, on Sept. 7. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

Looking upward in the lightwell, part of Chase Hall’s reconfigured main entrance onto Campus Avenue. Once this shaft was a stairwell. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

A student worker checks in at the Center for Purposeful Work, in newly renovated Chase Hall. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

This “barâ€� in the Purposeful Work suite is equipped with lockers for staff and student workers to stow their stuff. The angled wooden beams are load-bearing trusses that are original to century-old Chase Hall and have been left exposed as a reminder of the building’s long history. (Kristi Mynhier/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

Oak stair treads, blond high-tech floor decking, LED accent lights, and metal handrails all add to the Central Stair’s stylish appeal. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

Looking up through the Central Stair. The blond wood is cross-laminated timber, a wood product that’s greener than a traditional concrete and steel structure and much faster to install. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

This meeting room in Chase Hall’s new Student Affairs office suite houses a rugged fireplace original to the century-old building. The projecting brick pattern is replicated in decorative brick insets flanking the main Chase entrance. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

Comfy seating in the Residence Life offices. Stacked on the windowsill are board games that Res Life staff can borrow for student social events. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

In its latest incarnation, the once-clubby Chase Hall Lounge has a decidely businesslike look. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

Chase Hall Lounge post-renovation. Note the new location of the entrance, and to the right of that, the three indented rectangles — exterior windows that were bricked in when the building was expanded in the late 1940s. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

This seating area in the Student Affairs offices is situated about where art and stationery supplies were displayed in the College Store’s Chase Hall days. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

A view through glass of the lightwell from Chase Hall’s second-floor lobby. Applying black paint around the windows was among the last chores undertaken in the building’s 14-month makeover. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

Daylight in a flex office space in Chase Hall’s Purposeful Work suite. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

Cafe-style furniture lends an Old World ambience to this patio created from what was formerly the Dining Services loading dock. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

Summery summary: Does a tree falling in the woods make a sound if there’s no one around to hear it (or if someone is there but plugging their ears and singing “La, la, la!� to block it out)?

Does construction take place at ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ if Campus Construction Update doesn’t cover it?

We are not credentialed to address the first question. But we can confirm the existence, against all odds, of ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ construction that we haven’t covered.

During summer 2023, for instance, Campus Construction Update failed to tell you about new window units being installed at the Residential Village (a project begun in 2022, when we also didn’t mention it). Nor about new finishes beautifying the Plavin Dance Studio locker room, nor modern desks replacing the antediluvian units in two Hathorn Hall classrooms. But those things happened!

Meanwhile, among non–Chase Hall projects that we did bestir ourselves to tell you about, three that ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ had planned for the summer are done. (Still outstanding are repairs to Carnegie Science related to water damage from the July 25 cataclysm, but Smith and Hedge halls are fully back to their pre-flood selves.)

The inaugural contest on the brand-new Garcelon Field playing surface took place on Sept. 9, as women’s soccer welcomed Emerson College. The Bobcats didn’t prevail, but Head Coach Joe Vari said that the season opener “was extra-special with the new turf. The surface plays great and makes Garcelon a premier sports complex in Maine.â€� 

On Sept. 1, improvements to the attic of Hathorn Hall were completed, as builders finished repairing the platform beneath the bell tower, improving the ladder to the hatch leading to the roof, and activating a new HVAC machine. “We were able to wrap up just in the nick of time,� said Project Manager Brian Lanoie.

Also including new walkways, lighting, and retractable stairs for attic access, the project set the stage for replacement of the mechanism for sounding Hathorn’s historic bell. Preparations specific to that job are ongoing.

Finally, at the end of August, representatives from the West Coast firm DBPC finished installing high technology that drives ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½â€™ new Immersive Media Studio. Room 110 in Coram Library is home to the so-called IMStudio, which will enable the elevation of art and performance pieces to new levels of interactivity and sensory stimulation. (Imagine the Star Trek universe “holodecks,â€� but with less-predictable plot points.)

DBPC also provided training for faculty and staff who will work with students in operating the facility, which comprises four windowless walls coated in “projector screen� paint and an overhead grid that supports the active technology.

During the training “we installed projectors and speakers, and learned how to program the various components of the network system,â€� said Associate Professor of Theater Tim Dugan. Dugan and Carolina González Valencia, associate professor of art and visual culture, are co–principal investigators of the grant that funded the project. 

“When we tested some video and sound from [music professor] Asha Tamirisa’s and Carolina’s projects for the first time, it was magical. We were elated,â€� Dugan said.

The IMStudio is an expression of the ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ Arts Collaborative program called IMPACT 21st (Innovation, Media, Process, Arts, Collaboration, and Technology for the 21st century), a multifaceted approach to supporting students and faculty engaging in technology-based arts practices and education.

The IMStudio will host “visiting artists to exhibit and/or perform their state-of-the-art works for the community while engaging with students,â€� Dugan continued. â€œThis will provide faculty, staff, and students with opportunities to integrate technology into the arts curriculum through regular workshops and training, and artist residency programs.â€�

More broadly, adds González, it’s hoped that the facility will “create the space to collaborate between different disciplines and academic units.�

Needless to say, the studio’s potential for both creativity and education is ripe for exploration. In terms of public exposure, plans for a “soft openingâ€� are afoot, and an arts-faculty collaboration and open house in early December are also in the works. “I couldn’t be more excited about the potential that the IMStudio has to offer the ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ community,â€� Dugan said.

Thanks to Aaron Morse, associate athletic communications director, for additional reporting.

Can we talk? Campus Construction Update loves to hear from you. Please send questions, comments, and reminiscences about construction at ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College to dhubley@bates.edu, with “Campus Constructionâ€� or “La, la, la!â€� in the subject line.

One of the destructive torrential rains that have characterized this summer in New England hit Lewiston and Auburn on July 25.

Across the Twin Cities, the evening storm dumped nearly four inches of rain in less than two hours. It flooded streets, buckled pavements, and briefly shut off electricity to hundreds of residents.

In ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½â€™ neighborhood, the municipal stormwater drainage system was overwhelmed by the runoff. That meant that instead of entering that system as intended, much of the rain falling on ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ stayed at ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½, backing up into buildings and damaging walls, floors, and some equipment — and sparking an impressive cleanup response by the college’s Facilities Services team.

One of those buildings was Chase Hall — nearly ready to reopen after a 14-month renovation that is making this century-old student center a place that’s more welcoming and easier to navigate.

The storm hit one day after all the new furniture for Chase had arrived, three days before the city of Lewiston was scheduled to conduct its formal occupancy inspection, and less than a week before Student Affairs staff were scheduled to move in.

Most of the damage consisted of wet wallboard and carpeting (some of which was installed just hours before the storm). For the most part, the flood was less than an inch deep, but that was enough to necessitate throwing away new carpet and replacing strips of new wallboard adjoining the floor, along with the attached trim strips called “cove base.�

The stormwater affected portions of the lowest floors of Chase: a Residence Life office suite, the ground floor lobby, the Student Affairs offices in the former College Store site, and the bottom level of the new Central Stair.

That Central Stair location, in fact, was the scene of the most concentrated water damage. The pit at the base of the new elevator shaft filled up with water, which immersed and thereby ruined both the device that controls elevator speed and the cable that raises and lowers the car.

Still, as Senior Project Manager Paul Farnsworth pointed out during our visit on Aug. 1, the pit sequestered a lot of water that could have caused more widespread trouble elsewhere.

So now, more than two weeks after the deluge, where do things stand with Chase?

The city inspection that precedes the building’s certification for occupancy has been rescheduled for Aug. 25. An opening ceremony for the remodeled Chase is planned for Sept. 7.

And sometime in between, on a date or dates still to be determined, staff for Residence Life, the Center for Purposeful Work, and other Student Affairs functions will move into their new offices.

Just to give you some perspective, Student Affairs’ first heavy lift of the new school year — helping the new ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ies of the Class of 2027 get settled in — commences on Aug. 31. (For a different kind of perspective, the Bobcat Den reopens Aug. 28 after being closed for much too long.)

If the cloud-and-silver-lining metaphor seems tacky in this instance, it’s still true that the storm’s impact on Chase could have been much worse. Much of the building’s new furniture had been placed in storm-affected areas, but waterproof legs and feet resisted any damage. Replacement of the damaged wallboard is underway, and replacement carpet will be laid after the walls are repainted.

And as Farnsworth pointed out, “If this had happened three weeks later, everyone would have moved in and I would have had to move them all out again.�

The storm’s scrambling of the original Chase timetable has even conferred certain advantages. For example, with the move-in delayed, the project team has been able to tackle so-called day-two items — tasks normally left until after the certificate of occupancy has been issued. “We’re able to get a lot of that work done now, rather than having to come back after the building’s occupied,â€� said Kristi Mynhier, ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½â€™ project manager for Chase.

In at least one case, in fact, the storm even hastened Chase past a major milestone. As Mynhier explains, it was desirable to get the HVAC system running to help dry out the building. That entailed connecting the system to the campus-wide network of HVAC sensors and controls. So that got done faster than anticipated.

Meanwhile, in areas of Chase that didn’t get wet, the renovation is winding down. With the countertop and other woodwork now in place at the Overnook, the first-floor lobby is about done. The glass walls and doors have been installed around the reception area for the Office of Intercultural Education. And technicians are installing card-access readers in a variety of locations.

As noted, Chase wasn’t the only ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ building harmed by the storm: Carnegie Science, Smith, Hedge, and Kalperis halls were the others. “Merrill Gym and Lindholm House had water that was removed, but no real damage to finishes,â€� notes Jay Phillips, director of Facility Services operations. (There was water erosion and other damage to the campus grounds, too.)

Phillips adds that some 40 ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ staffers, including custodians and folks in the building trades, were involved in the clean-up and subsequent repairs. A crew from the cleaning and restoration company ServPro also helped out.

Nearly a week after a storm soaked floors in Chase Hall, getting things dry was still a priority. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

An Aug. 1 image from the Student Affairs office suite shows the aftermath of the July 25 rain: new carpet has been discarded, a 12-inch strip of wallboard removed, and a dehumidifier and fan are drying things out. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

Just prior to the July 25 deluge, this Residence Life office had been fully carpeted. Stormwater entering through an HVAC condensate drain soaked, and spoiled, parts of the new carpet that were subsequently stripped out for replacement. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

One outcome of the July 25 stormwater backup into Chase Hall was a profusion of trash cans staged on the loading dock for emptying. But soon the dock, with furniture like something from a Parisian sidewalk cafe, will be a place for repose and for socializing. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

A new Purposeful Work interview room on Chase Hall’s second floor. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

Plastic covers still protect much of the new furniture in a second-floor lounge in Chase Hall. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

At 89 inches, this television in a second-floor Chase Hall lounge is ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½â€™ largest flatscreen. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

Sitting at a new table amidst other furnishings awaiting deployment, a member of the Consigli Construction staff works in Chase Hall Lounge. Note the remodeled ceiling, and the relocated wall in the background. The territory beyond will belong to the Center for Purposeful Work. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

At one time this wall separating the Central Stair and Chase Hall Lounge was the rear outside wall of Chase Hall. During the recent renovation, the old window openings were restored and reglazed to add visual interest to the building’s interior. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

Inspired by ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ Manufacturing Company bedspreads, woven in Lewiston, decorative metalwork has been applied to the front of the Overnook in Chase Hall’s first-floor lobby. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

Chase Hall’s newly renovated main lobby. The stairway to the left of center leads to Memorial Commons. The corridor at center, adjacent to the new Overnook, leads to the Central Stair. The new staircase behind the column emerges on the second floor at Skelton and Hirasawa lounges. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

The stairs and corridor to Memorial Commons have been snazzed up with new paint, floor and step coverings, and handrails. The blue material provides temporary protection to the new flooring. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

This seating area in the Center for Purposeful Work backs up to the so-called lightwell, a former stairwell that still encloses one of Chase Hall’s two Campus Avenue entrances. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

New paint, carpet, and furniture in a dean’s office in Chase Hall. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

A view of the Central Stair and its elevator. Note the stylish new handrails. The blue plastic floor protection conceals oak stair treads and flooring (visible overhead) made from cross-laminated timber. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

The reconstruction of Chase Hall’s main Campus Avenue entrance was nearly complete on Aug. 1, with just some missing trim and cleaning up to attend to. The doors predate the building’s renovation and were refinished for it. Note the textured brick pattern where the benches meet the building: projecting Flemish bond. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

When a building is flooded, Phillips explains, “It’s critical to get vent holes drilled and walls opened, drying equipment deployed, and lots of air moving within the first 24 hours, or the risk of mold growth increases.

“Our people responded exceptionally well, and their initial response along with continued action the next day prevented further damage and potential mold growth. I’m always impressed by the incredible work our folks perform and their great professionalism under pressure in these difficult situations.â€�

Projection room: Immersive Media Studio all but done

ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½â€™ new Immersive Media Studio, located in a former classroom and computer lab in Coram Library, is close to completion.

Funded by a $500,000 grant from the Sherman Fairchild Foundation, the facility will support instruction in and production of high-tech performances and installations incorporating sound, live action, and projected imagery.

When we visited on Aug. 1, all but a final coat of wall paint, a white “4K� formula that shows projected images to especially good advantage, had been applied. Black floor tiles were placed this week. The ceiling had been coated in matte black paint. With cables newly strung from the control room next door, the ceiling pipe-grid was ready to support the projectors, theatrical lights, and speakers that will cast the digital spells.

Still in their boxes, those gizmos and others were stockpiled in the control room. Technicians from the West Coast firm DBPC had spent the back half of July in there installing computers and controllers, with plans to return and finish up this month, in time for the start of classes.

Tin-knockers get ducts in a row in Hathorn Hall attic

With installation beginning the last week of July, the new retractable stairs that provide access to Hathorn Hall’s attic are in place. Getting to the attic is still a climb, but now a visitor is spared the claustrophobic aspects of the prior arrangement — a steep ladder, jammed into a closet in a faculty office, that topped out in something like the Munsters’ living room but without the laugh track.

Bright new lighting and solid, easily accessed walkways have put an end to the Munstery aspects.

Also in the attic is a new HVAC machine that replaced an obsolete unit, a substitution that in large part was the impetus for the Hathorn attic project. Cote Corp. of Auburn, known for challenging feats of hoisting and rigging, removed the old machine and brought in the new one, which is roughly the size of a chest freezer. Happily, the elevator was large enough to fit each unit, albeit with tolerances as close as an inch or two, says Brian Lanoie, ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ project manager.

The HVAC work also entailed the replacement of a lot of air ducts, work done by the tin-knockers of Nason Mechanical Systems of Auburn. Still to be done on the HVAC front is connecting the new equipment to its power supply and to the campus-wide control network.

More broadly, carpentry contractor M.W. Hoss of Portland needs to restructure the attic floor where a hole was cut for the HVAC equipment (a smaller hole at that location where the new stairs are mounted still remains) and refinish the corresponding third-floor ceiling.

This view was taken from the top of the new retractable ladder serving the Hathorn Hall attic. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

New ventilation ducts in the attic of Hathorn Hall. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

The installation of this new air handler was a key goal of the summer’s refurbishment of the attic of Hathorn Hall. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

Carpenters for M.W. Hoss of Portland, Maine, built this new ladder leading up to the Hathorn Hall belfry. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

And all that work, taking place through August, will complete this phase of the Hathorn attic project. The next phase, the replacement of the ringer for Hathorn’s bell, has yet to be scheduled.

Garcelon Field turf: ‘Bouncy and cushy‘

With athletic practices scheduled to start before the end of August, the overhaul of a landmark sports facility at ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ is nearly finished.

Home to Bobcat lacrosse, soccer (occasionally), and — with the deepest historical roots — football, Garcelon Field has received a new playing surface this summer. A product called Legion, made by Shaw Sports Turf, the new artificial turf replaces the surface that was installed in 2010 and had reached the limit of its useful life.

ThenNow

An aerial view of Garcelon Field before and after its turf replacement. Use your mouse to grab the slider (or swipe your finger if on a phone or tablet) to reveal more or less of each image. (Branden Rush/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

Both products comprise a grass-like plastic matrix that’s infilled with a mix of sand and crumb rubber. And both surfaces were installed by R.A.D. Sports of Rockland, Mass.

While the Legion is essentially complete (as is a replacement for the 2010 chain-link fence that had surrounded the field), Garcelon remains closed for another week or two while punch-listing and some tests are being conducted.

The turf came in massive rolls that were spooled out into place across the field by specially equipped tractors. But we were interested to learn from Chris Streifel, ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ project manager for the turf replacement, that a significant proportion of the installation was performed by people using hand tools. Their work included finalizing the placement of the rolls, tweaking their seams, and — perhaps most interesting — setting in all but the biggest markings on the turf.

As a multi-sport field, Garcelon uses different colors for markings pertaining to different games. Most of these graphics can’t be fabricated at the factory and have to be created by hand on site. “So a lot of customized stuff would be done right on the field, and they would cut out pieces and sew in new pieces,� explains Streifel, the college’s director of capital planning and construction.

“Then somebody goes through and checks all that. So they actually spent the last week just going over in fine detail all of those seams.� Note that this is all done on hands and knees.

“And now you can’t even tellâ€� that the work was done by hand. “It all blends together like it was always together from day one.â€� Streifel adds, “It’s a lot of fine detail and a lot of expertise.â€�

A close-up of the new Legion playing surface on Garcelon Field shows the artificial grass and the sand-and-crumb-rubber infill. (Jay Burns/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

The north end of the newly resurfaced Garcelon Field. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

As Garcelon Field is a multi-sport facility, different colors indicate markings on the turf for different games. Most of these field graphics were sewn in by hand. (Jay Burns/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

The colors pop on Garcelon Field’s new Legion playing surface. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

A view of the new Legion playing surface, made by Shaw Sports Turf, on Garcelon Field. Many of the markings shown were cut and stitched in by hand. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

“It was a very smooth project,â€� he notes. Because ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ issued its request for bids on the project early, the college was able to get a high slot on R.A.D.’s calendar and avoid the cumulative delays that are almost inevitable over the course of a busy contractor’s summer. “I have nothing but good things to say about the R.A.D. Sports team and Gale Associates, our designer.â€� Gale is based in Portland.

“The field’s awesome,â€� Streifel continues. “It’s so fun to step on. It’s so bouncy and cushy, and if I was going to get tackled hard by somebody at this point, that’s where I’d want to have it happen.â€�

Can we talk? Campus Construction Update loves to hear from you. Please send questions and comments about past, present, future, and past-perfect construction at ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ to dhubley@bates.edu, with “Campus Constructionâ€� or “Does this work make you tense?â€� in the subject line.

Still a constellation of construction hotspots, but with ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ folks scheduled to move back in by the second week of August, newly refurbished Chase Hall had a certain air of anticipation when we visited last week — something along the lines of, “Is it Christmas yet?â€�

Well, Ralphie, we’re getting there. Parts of the building are all but finished, sitting empty and quiet, such as the first-floor Purposeful Work suite and the second-floor corridor that parallels Campus Avenue. On the second floor, in fact, the conclusive inspection protocol known as punch-listing began last Friday.

In other Chase spaces, though, the 15-month renovation continues full tilt, with tools and supplies fully deployed, various plastics protecting new finishes, extension cords feeding power from temporary electrical boxes, and sprinkler hoses and data cables dangling from open ceiling grids.

In the big picture, as we’ve reported previously, project management firm Consigli Construction expects to hand control of the building back to ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ by the end of July. An interesting focus of attention at the moment is the fire protection system, which includes — in addition to alarms, sprinklers, and illuminated exit signs — controls that, in the event of a fire, switch off the electromagnets that hold certain doors open. The resulting automatic closures of those strategically placed doors can help contain a blaze.

Another system that’s desirable to have in place by the time people move back in, though not directly related to life-safety, comprises local controls for heating, ventilation, and air conditioning, says ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ Project Manager Kristi Mynhier.

Specifically, there are gizmos that tell the system when humans enter a room so that local air flow and temperature will adjust to accommodate their comfort — an amenity that, in the interest of energy conservation, is otherwise quiescent. Those devices are known as occupancy sensors. Professionals call them as “occ sensors,� but that strikes us as occward jargon.

Bond — projecting Flemish bond: When we visited on June 27, bricklayers were piecing in a bold decorative pattern known as projecting Flemish bond on either side of the main Campus Avenue entrance. Over the entrance, the wooden form for a stainless steel awning was in place. Stainless panels on either side lent a sense of how all the steel trim might look when it’s complete.

Around the corner near the Muskie Archives, new facing had been applied to the sides of the former Chase loading dock, which is becoming a sort of patio. A new floor surface, railings, and outdoor furniture are coming soon. Together with gray asphalt pavers that were recently laid at either side, the area will be known as a plaza.

Inside, specifically in Chase Hall Lounge, new “faux beams� have joined the originals. None of these non-load-bearing features hold up the ceiling, but they do prettify it, and the new faux beams will contain light fixtures, so they can lord that sense of practical purpose over the old beams. New hardwood floorboards for the lounge were stacked in the first-floor lobby to acclimate and will be laid near the end of the renovation.

But new oak stair steps are already being installed on the central stair, a sort of three-dimensional crossroads that connects four levels of the building. The job involves two trades, as carpenters fasten the wood in place and rout out a rectangular depression to fit rubber treads, which will then be glued in by flooring installers. Easier to replace than the wooden steps, the inserts will take the wear from all the feet that use the stair (a song lyric in the making!).

Painters are coating the walls throughout the central stair. (And they’ve finished that eye-catching saturated red on the elevator’s wallboard enclosure.)

Painting is in progress in the first-floor lobby, too, including the new Overnook, that slightly elevated seating area along one wall. Before too long, it will sport new steel railings, which are being fabricated in a pattern resembling the famed ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ Manufacturing bedspreads once woven in Lewiston. And that lobby is being cleared of building supplies, aside from the lounge floorboards.

On the upper level of the ground floor — let’s try that again. On what has been called the loading dock level and is now the plaza level — see above — the Residence Life office suite has made big strides since our last visit. Glass doors have been hung at the entrance, most utility terminal fixtures are in place, shiny fan-coil heater-coolers cling to the walls, and fresh paint abounds.

Temporarily a place to store paint, this is the future home of the ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ Musicians Union. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

Here’s a view of the central stair approached from Chase Hall’s first-floor lobby. The red walls enclose the elevator shaft. The two ladders stand at the entrance to the Office of Intercultural Education. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

Chase Hall’s new air handling machine. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

The “Overnook,â€� a distinctive seating area in Chase Hall’s first-floor lobby, looks spiffy with new wallboard and paint on June 27. Sections of air duct are currently stashed there. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

This hardwood flooring will be installed in Chase Hall Lounge toward the end of the Chase renovation. Shown on June 27, it was stored in the Chase Hall lobby to acclimate. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

New landscaping in front of Chase Hall on a gray day in June. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

A handrail awaits its installation in a new stairwell in Chase Hall. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

Floor-to-ceiling glass admits a lot of light into this new “huddle” meeting room in the Residence Life offices. A former Dining Services loading dock, just outside the glass, will be transformed into a patio. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

Once the Chase Hall loading dock, this concrete platform is being transformed into a patio. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

Good griddance

Since our last visit to Coram 110, the future site of ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½â€™ Immersive Media Studio, its walls have been stripped of features. With the goal of rendering the walls into a smooth white surface suitable for image projection, the space has lost, among other things, interior window frames, chalkboards and projection screens, ventilation grilles, outlets for electricity and data, and a species of wood trim called a chair rail that kept belligerent furniture from roughing up the walls.

While daylight was abundant in the room during our visit, the outdoors won’t be viewable from the former classroom for long: Plywood panels that we saw stacked against the walls will soon block the window openings on the inside, although the exterior frames will remain.

But you know the old saying: When a window closes, a ceiling grid appears, and that’s what has happened in Coram 110. Specifically, it’s a theatrical-grade pipe grid. Composed of black 1.5-inch steel pipe, this sturdy frame will enable studio users “to hang anything anywhere,� said Senior Project Manager Paul Farnsworth, referring to the lights, projectors, speakers, and other gear (disco balls?) that will provide images and sounds for productions in the studio.

The ceiling will be painted black so as not to draw attention away from the immersive art and performance action taking place below. The floor, too, will be black, in the form of quartz tiles.

An adjacent room will be equipped as the studio’s control center, home to the high-powered technology that will drive productions in the studio. In the early project planning, that function was located right in 110 itself. But the erstwhile occupant of the room next door, Michael Hanrahan, ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½â€™ director for curricular and research computing, volunteered to move his office to Hedge Hall, thereby freeing more space for productions in the studio itself.

The control room, Farnsworth pointed out, houses one of the two massive fireplaces that originally helped to heat Coram, built in 1902. That fireplace has long been hidden behind wall board — but workers drilled through an upper corner of its 120-year-old brick facade to make way for cables that will connect the 21st-century control center to the immersive-studio gizmos on the ceiling grid.

Talk about worlds colliding.

Pad notes

At Garcelon Field, the 13-year-old FieldTurf was removed during the third week of June in preparation for a new playing surface, which is being laid now. When we visited on June 27, the dirt substrate had been graded and a small crew from the project contractor, R.A.D. Sports of Rockland, Mass., was placing a layer of shock-absorbent turf pads that would buffer between the ground and the playing surface itself.

Weighing just a few pounds apiece, the pads are composed of an aggregate of recycled chunks of soft rubber or plastic. It took 4,275 of them to blanket the field, which measures about 100,000 square feet.

They are laid held together by tabs and indents superficially resembling jigsaw puzzle pieces, but in regular shapes and intervals, making the pad layer easy to assemble but not much fun on a rainy day up to camp.

Meanwhile, 40 or so plastic-wrapped rolls of the new playing surface itself, a Shaw Sports Turf product called Legion, were stockpiled around Garcelon along with giant sacks of the sand-and-rubber-crumb infill that will finish the installation. Placement of the Legion started this week, with infill to follow by mid-July.

In this June 21 image, the Garcelon Field crew from R.A.D. Sports has finished removing the 2010 FieldTurf surface. (Aaron Morse/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

In this June 27 image, Garcelon Field has been stripped of its old playing surface and the placement of shock-absorbing panels on the bare ground is about to begin. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

Stockpiled near the Garcelon Field scoreboard on June 27 are shock pads that will underlay the field’s new playing surface. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

Placing shock-absorbing turf pads on Garcelon Field as an underlayment for the forthcoming Legion playing surface. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

The turf pads that form a shock-absorbing layer underneath the Garcelon playing surface are made from recycled materials. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

Shown near Central Avenue on June 27 are some of the 40 rolls of Shaw Sports Turf that will soon be placed on Garcelon Field. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

Ring, but no swing

Over at Hathorn Hall, someone cut a big hole in the third-floor ceiling. All part of the plan, of course, as retractable stairs will eventually be installed in the hole to improve access to the building’s attic and its historic bell.

In addition to the hole in the ceiling (something that some of us get to enjoy with no effort whatsoever!), the project team addressed two other objectives that will make the completion of the overall project easier and safer. One was the installation of several long LED light fixtures, replacing a few dim, widely dispersed lamps. The other was the creation of new walkways.

The hole, by the way, will come in handy during next week when old HVAC machines and ductwork are removed from the attic and a new machine is winched up there for installation. Cote Corp. of Auburn will handle that rigging job. Sometime later, the hole will be smallified to fit the new stairs.

The HVAC upgrade is a major goal of the Hathorn project. A second is to improve access to the bell, whose ringing mechanism will be replaced in hopes of returning the bell to its former prominence. In response to a question from Bruce Lyman ’67, we learned that an electromagnetic striker will supplant the current winch and cable that currently swing the bell. (It hasn’t been determined whether the striker will contact the inside of the bell or the outside.)

A necessary concession to cost and practicality, the proposed striker will mean the bell no longer swings to ring. But a representative of the ringing mechanism provider, Elderhorst Bells Inc. of Palm, Pa., assures us that the striker can be made to emulate the characteristic, romantic “double ring� of a swinging bell before it comes to rest.

Can we talk? Campus Construction Update loves to hear from you. Please send questions and comments about past, present, future, and past-perfect construction at ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ to dhubley@bates.edu, with “Campus Constructionâ€� or “You used that Flemish bond joke already before!â€� in the subject line.

Two high-profile summer projects got underway at ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ this week.

A new playing surface will be installed on Garcelon Field, replacing the FieldTurf whose arrival we told you about in 2010.

And improvements to Hathorn Hall’s third floor and attic will provide easier access to that building’s belfry, making possible, in turn, the return of Hathorn’s beloved bell to something like its old prominence.

Like the work we covered last week, the ongoing renovation of Chase Hall and the creation of an immersive media studio in Coram Library, the Garcelon and Hathorn projects involve campus landmarks whose long histories resound in ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ lore.

Toll house: Rung by hand some 19 times a day when it was new, in 1857, has been heard from less and less in recent years.

Well into the 20th century, the 1,000-pound bell was a unifying voice on campus in ways both pragmatic and moral. The bell marked the hours of the day, summoned students to meals and chapel, and celebrated climactic moments athletic and academic, notably Commencement. Even into this century, Hathorn’s “clong� resounded at class times and the noon hour. (Until the mid-20th century, the bell was rung by students carefully selected for their reliability — not to mention their tolerance for a spartan living situation, as they resided in a room in Hathorn under less than cozy conditions.)

In recent years, though, the bell has been rung only for Commencement and Convocation. That’s because the bell’s own stock in trade — time itself — has caught up with both the bell and its structural surroundings.

The electric ringing mechanism has become unreliable and potentially hazardous. Getting into Hathorn’s attic and thence the belfry, currently via a stepladder from the third floor, takes nerve and some muscle. The attic itself is dark, grimy, and confusing — a thicket of 166-year-old beams and joists — and visitors must closely watch where they put their feet. (Note to self: submit bill for shoe lost in attic.)

A primary objective of this summer’s project is to dramatically improve not only access to the attic, via a new retractable stairway, but lighting and walkways. Also in the cards is a replacement for the ladder up to the belfry (where yet a third ladder and trapdoor provide access to the bell itself). All of that work will pave the way for replacement of the ringing mechanism. 

The attic project also entails the removal of four old HVAC machines and the installation of a single state-of-the-art unit that will serve the third floor, says Brian Lanoie, ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ project manager for aspects of the work not directly related to the bell.

The present ringing system uses an electric winch to pull a cable that’s looped around the bell wheel, rocking the bell and causing the free-swinging clapper to strike the interior. (It’s not clear when the winch system was installed, though a 1956 issue of The ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ Student contains a possible allusion to that development.)

Normally the system is controlled by a timer, found elsewhere in Hathorn, that’s programmed to ring at specified dates and times. A manual override is used for special occasions such as Commencement.

While it has still been rung for special events, “the bell has not been routinely active for a couple years now� because of the need for upgrading “to a more contemporary and safer set-up,� says Alan Kelley, mechanical services manager for Facility Services.

In particular, the cable-and-winch mechanism poses a risk of dislodging the bell from its mounting. â€œIt’s a rare event, but out of an abundance of caution, we chose to shut it down for routine operation until it can be modified.â€�

In the new mechanism, the bell itself will sit still and an electronically activated clapper will strike its sides. Interestingly, this marks a change in the basic technology of the Hathorn bell: No longer will rope, student muscle, cable, nor a winch be needed to evoke that familiar sound.

“Once the attic is renovated and we have safe access, the bell controls will be retrofitted and put back in regular service,â€� Kelley says. 

A Portland company, MW Hoss, will install the new attic ladder and plywood flooring. Also on the job are two local firms, DeBlois Electric of Lewiston and Nason Mechanical Systems of Auburn. This week‘s work began with a day of site mobilization, says Brian Lanoie, and by the end of the week there should be a hole in the third-story ceiling to accommodate the removal of old HVAC equipment, and ultimately the installation of new access stairs.

Turf’s up: Regarded as one of the 10 oldest college football fields in the U.S., Garcelon Field will renew its claim to modernity this summer with the replacement of its 13-year-old playing surface. (A marker at Garcelon, by the way, notes that ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ was the site of the first college football game in Maine. But the game itself, against Tufts, took place across campus where the Gillespie Hall dorm now stands.)

Handily enough, the formal portrait of the Class of 2023 shows off the 13-year-old FieldTurf that’s now being replaced. (Theophil Syslo/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

A football game on the living (if somewhat stressed) grass on Garcelon Field sometime in the 1920s. (Edmund S. Muskie Archives and Special Collections Library)

This image of Jamie Walker ’07 of Needham, Mass., moving a pile of Colby defenders, was taken during a game in October 2006. That was four years before the advent of artificial turf on Garcelon Field, and the advantages of the manufactured product are clear. The photo later appeared in Sports Illustrated. (Daryn Slover for ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

In this 2010 image, workers prepare to flip another strip of FieldTurf, at left, into place. (Gabrielle Otto ’11 for ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

R.A.D. Sports, the Massachusetts company that installed the current FieldTurf surface in 2010, submitted the winning bid to overhaul the field again. The black chain-link fence surrounding the field will also be replaced. The work will likely be complete by early August, says Director of Capital Planning and Construction Chris Streifel, who is managing the project. 

The new surface will be a Shaw Sports Turf product called Legion. Like the 2010 FieldTurf, Legion will consist of a grass-like plastic matrix buffered with a mix of sand and crumb rubber particles. Such products resemble natural grass in their playing qualities, but are much easier to maintain and more durable.

After getting established at the site, removing the old turf, naturally, is R.A.D.’s first order of business. Streifel notes that where the 2010 turf installation (which, by the way, was the first use of an artificial surface on that field) necessitated substantial underground drainage work, this summer’s effort is much simpler.

“After the existing turf is removed, the contractor will do some very fine grading to restore the precise slopes needed,� says Streifel. And then the new surface will go down. Streifel adds that the graphics on the new turf will be updated.

And what will happen to the old turf? “We may retain some of it for use in the storage areas beneath the grandstand,� Streifel says, and in any case, it will all be recycled or reused in some way. “Once it leaves the site, we don’t directly control that process. I don’t know the details yet,� but they will become clear in the fullness of time.

Can we talk? Campus Construction Update loves to hear from you. Please send questions, comments, and inflammatory speculation about construction at ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College to dhubley@bates.edu, with “Campus Constructionâ€� or “Has anyone made the bats-in-the-belfry joke yet?â€� in the subject line.

Hot Quad, summer on campus: Back of our neck getting dirty and…say, what rhymes with “campus,” anyway?

Without the Lovin’ Spoonful’s John Sebastian to help with that couplet, we’ll just have to skip the tuneage and tell you, instead, about some construction projects in progress at ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ this summer.

The biggest news is that faculty, their summer-research students, and staff began moving into the Bonney Science Center on June 7.

“People are in that moment of euphoria, to some degree, where they’re just so excited to finally move in after all this thinking and stressing about it,â€� says Chris Streifel, the Facility Services project manager for both the science center and a larger reconfiguration of science facilities at ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½. “Everybody’s just so happy to have that relief.â€�

Professors and staff quartered till now in Dana Chemistry Hall completed their transition to Bonney this week. Clearing Dana was the priority because that building is about to begin a comprehensive, yearlong reconfiguration into a center for teaching introductory science.

“The real story of the last few weeks has been getting Bonney done in the nick of time and getting Dana empty,â€� Streifel says. “That’s a pretty monumental accomplishment. And it’s something we’ve been thinking about for a long time, how we’re going to do that and setting that upâ€� — in fact, since 2018.

Meanwhile, the faculty who’ll be crossing Campus Avenue from ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½â€™ third science building, Carnegie, to new digs in Bonney will start moving next week. But the bigger part of the Carnegie contingent will relocate in August.

The moving of people and material from Dana Chemistry to the Bonney Science Center began on June 8. (Phyllis Graber Jensen/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

Summer research students put away supplies and equipment in a second-floor Bonney Center lab on June 28. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

As he settles into his new Bonney Center lab, Andrew Kennedy, assistant professor of chemistry and biochemistry, makes sure that credit goes where it’s due. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

Jars and bottles for chemicals in a second-floor lab. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

The south face of the Bonney Center with Chu Hall in the background. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

Biologist Ryan Bavis, biologist-neuroscientist Martin Kruse, and neuroscientist Jason Castro share this second-floor lab. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

There’s plenty of unpacking to do in this chemistry instrumentation room. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

Bonney Center office furniture seen from Bardwell Street. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

The Bonney Science Center seen from the junction of Campus Avenue and Nichols Street on June 28, 2021. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

Two specialized firms handled the transfer of ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ assets from Dana to Bonney. Tobin Scientific of Beverly, Mass., shifted the science equipment, and Environmental Projects Inc. of Auburn, Maine, conveyed the chemical supplies. They have “done a fantastic job,â€� says Streifel.

Also deserving applause, says Streifel, is ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ construction administrator Jacob Kendall, a constant presence as the new building came together. “Jacob has been absolutely a monster in this move, just keeping everybody going. He’s got a real knack for this kind of thing.â€�

Bonney construction has largely dwindled down to the building-trades equivalents of crossing t’s and dotting i’s. Aside from an exterior pass still outstanding, primary punch-list inspections are finished and the project team has embarked on what’s called “back punch.�

Not the gesture of affection remembered so fondly from grammar school, this, instead, is making sure that corrections generated by the first round of inspections were done right.

Commissioning of the building’s mechanical, electrical, and plumbing machinery is likewise well-along, although, as Streifel points out, that barrage of inspections and tests won’t really be done till next spring: HVAC equipment, in particular, needs to be tested again with each change of season.

As for the few remaining chores at Bonney, there are finishing touches to apply inside and out, such as the installation of protective grates over the building’s sunken air intake, now concealed by a wall lettered with “Bonney Science Center.� And there’s plenty of landscaping to do, an undertaking made challenging by the persistent lack of rain.

One of the three massive air handlers in the Bonney Center basement. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

Water pumps, at center, and pipes in the Bonney Center penthouse. The liquids in this system are used to regulate interior air temperatures — “GHWR” stands for “glycol hot water.” (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

Chemical storage on the first floor of the Bonney Center. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

The distinctive green is a hallmark of the firm that designed the Bonney Science Center, Payette. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

Acid lockers on the Bonney Center’s first floor. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

White and Payette-green paint, glass walls, infrastructure doubling as decorative treatment — these are some of the visual characteristics of the Bonney Center interior. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

Totes and cartons awaiting unpacking by a member of the chemistry faculty. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

These grates will cover the opening to the Bonney Center’s subterranean air intake. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

In fact, it won’t be for another year or so that the science center really settles into its final appearance. That’s because the far end of the parking lot (an area formerly occupied by the two houses of the ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ Communications Office) will continue to house storage containers and other facilities supporting the Dana Hall makeover.

Oil’s well that ends well: Starting this winter, carbon-neutral ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ will use even less fossil fuel thanks to fried-food enthusiasts around the Northeast. (We’re happy to do our part!)

With two of the three boilers that steam-heat the central campus already burning a product called Renewable Fuel Oil, the college is converting the third unit for a different climate-friendly fuel: vegetable oil recovered from the food-service industry.

Lifecycle Renewables of Tewksbury, Mass., will supply the fuel, known as LR-100.

ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½â€™ use of LR-100 will be limited. Boiler No. 3 is a back-up boiler, operated when one of the others is out of service. Renewable Fuel Oil, made from waste wood products by the Canadian firm Ensyn, will remain the primary fuel for the campus steam plant’s two workhorse boilers.

“We prefer to burn RFO because it’s a wood-based product, and that helps our forest industry here in Maine and the Northeast,â€� says ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ energy manager John Rasmussen. “They’re in desperate need of a market for low-quality wood, pulpwood basically. The market has been reduced by 2 million tons a yearâ€� as the paper industry has contracted in recent years.

But “whenever there’s some supply disruption [with RFO], instead of using natural gas as backup, we can now use LR-100.â€� Lifecycle Renewables runs a sizable cooking oil collection network in Massachusetts and beyond — even cleaning grease traps for its clients and recovering that oil.

The initial conversion to RFO, in 2016, was no trivial matter, entailing the erection of a 20,000-gallon tank, installation of various equipment to make the oil burnable, and the refitting of Boiler No. 1 with an injector that can stand up to the acidic fuel. With the fuel-handling system in place, Boiler No. 2 just needed the retrofitted combustion components.

The No. 3 conversion for LR-100, though, is the simplest of all. The tanks once used for petroleum-based fuel oil just need cleaning prior to filling with LR-100, and the boiler’s burner gun is fine as is. So the only additions needed for the conversion are an inline heater to promote fuel flow and a system for measuring the efficiency of all three boilers. That’s all happening this month. (LR-100 will also work with boilers 1 and 2 with no modification — and all three boilers will remain dual-fuel, with natural gas as an alternative.)

That metering system, by the way, is a requirement of the state program that is making this conversion possible. As part of Gov. Janet Mills’ drive to curtail fossil fuel use, it offers a mechanism of “thermal RECs� — renewable energy certificates — to offset the cost of sustainable fuels, making them competitive with natural gas.

What prompted this project, Rasmussen says, was the desire to diversify ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½â€™ sources of heating fuel. Gallon for gallon, LR-100 is quite close to petroleum-based oil in heat content, and provides substantially more energy than RFO — some 128,000 BTUs per gallon vs. 80,000.

But RFO costs less. And either way, says Rasmussen, “it’s nice to know that we can basically eliminate fossil fuel use� in heating the central campus.

Better slate than never: Slate seems to be a theme for Hathorn Hall upgrades this summer.

For starters, the building’s slate roof is being replaced. G&E Roofing, of Augusta, Maine, is handling the project, which also includes new copper gutters and downspouts, as well as a new rubber-like membrane on the top of the belfry. Facility Services carpenters are pitching in by fabricating some massive new moldings for the Hathorn roof.

How old is the slate being replaced? “The jury is still out on that,� says Bob Leavitt, assistant director of maintenance and operations for Facility Services. “The best guess is pushing 100 years.�

He adds, “We’re very pleased to find that the majority of the roof structure itself is in excellent condition — very few places showing deterioration. So it was installed probably as well as you can imagine back in the day.�

A 2017 roofing assessment anticipated the slate replacement, which was scheduled originally for 2020 but delayed by COVID-19. In progress since early June, the job will be wrapped up by mid- to late August.

Leavitt estimates that 6,000 square feet of slate will be replaced. New England Slate Co. of Poultney, Vt., is supplying the product, which has been quarried to order — “North Country Black� at the Glendyne Quarry in Saint-Marc-du-Lac-Long, Québec, and “Vermont Purple� at the John Maslack Slate Quarry in Poultney. The colors match the original roof of the building, in keeping with its listing on the National Register of Historic Sites.

Meanwhile, a differently used variety of Hathorn slate is being superseded. “We’re replacing some of the chalkboards in Hathorn, old slate chalkboards,â€� says project manager Paul Farnsworth. “The faculty don’t like them. They’re small and they’re not at the right height. Some are cracked. Some are easy to write on but some of them are too smooth.

“Well, on June 21, we took down the first of what we thought were the original slate chalkboards.� And what did they find behind it? Another slate chalkboard — complete with math problems from some long-ago class session.

Farnsworth reckons that the surprise discovery must be one of the boards installed when Hathorn was built, in 1857. In all, Farnsworth’s crew found original chalkboards behind the existing units in two rooms, 303 and 305. (The cryptic inscription “Thank You� / “May 16—1892� appears on wallpaper uncovered in a different classroom.)

In the photo above, the white stuff slathered on the original slate is plaster of Paris or something similar, applied to prevent the newer board from bowing inward under pressure.

Farnsworth is replacing nine of the old boards and adding two boards to Hathorn’s total because, as he says, “everyone always wants more writing surface.� (Hence this 1,900-word Campus Construction Update.) The replacements are unframed porcelain-on-steel units. “They’re nice.�

“You can’t buy natural slate chalkboards anymore,â€� he adds. “We received positive feedback from the man-made sample we had for faculty and staff to try writing on.â€�

Supplying the boards is New York Blackboard of Hillside, N.J. “They are the people, as far as I can tell, that know chalkboards,� Farnsworth explains. “And they delivered them, instead of shipping them — two of the people that drove them up were the grandfather that started the company ages ago and his grandson.�

That delivery was in March. “They thought I was going to install them as soon as I got them, and they were all ready to help. And I was like, ‘I’m sorry to disappoint you. I’m just going to put them in storage.’â€�

Originally slated (sorry!) for 2020, the chalkboard work finally began a couple weeks ago and should wrap up early this month.

New cages for the Cage: With one complete and the second in progress, summer 2021 is bringing significant improvements to the Gray Athletic Building.

Complete is the installation of two new batting cages for baseball and softball. As Facility Services project manager Shelby Burgau explains, they replace units that weren’t quite spacious enough for their intended use, yet were so bulky as to create some concern about building egress.

Those old cages folded up against the interior walls at the Alumni Gym and Muskie Archives ends of the space, but when in use they were aligned along the wall adjacent to the Library Quad — a wall with three main entrances.

In contrast, when in use, the new cages are tucked in at the Muskie end. When not, they are collapsed and then hoisted up, up, and away into the rafters of the Gray Cage. “So they’re completely out of the way,â€� Burgau says. “They look a lot nicer, a lot cleaner, and you can put one down or both down. So now you can have a cage down, but still use the basketball courts.â€�

Consisting of nylon mesh and a metal frame, each cage is 12 by 72 feet. They were manufactured by Seaway Plastics, which has operations in Quebec and in New York state.

Meanwhile, in progress is the placement of a new floor in Gray, for which preparation began this week. The new surface will be a rubber multipurpose flooring manufactured by MONDO and installed by FJ Roberts–AASG Sports Surfaces of Wilmington, Mass. Installed directly atop the old floor, a urethane surface that in turn sits atop asphalt, the new 8mm product will be laid in 6-foot wide strips and fused together.

The new floor should be ready for action by mid-August.

Can we talk? Campus Construction Update welcomes queries and comments about current, past, future, timeless, and “that never happened — or did it?” construction at ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½. Write to dhubley@bates.edu, putting “Campus Constructionâ€� or “’Pampas’ rhymes with ‘campus’! Do I get royalties?â€� in the subject line.

Doug Hubley is a writer and musician living in Portland, Maine.

Active renovation is bringing two Carnegie Science Hall classrooms closer to their new role as settings for the teaching approach called active learning.

The heavier lift has been the makeover of Carnegie 339. Structural demolition that took place during July left the room barely recognizable in early August. Gone are the tiered floor and two partition walls that enclosed a storeroom and projection booth — and yet the curious effect of this volumetric enlargement was to make the room seem smaller.

Room 339 in Carnegie Science Hall is shown on Aug. 9, midway through its renovation. The classroom is being made over to support active learning. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

Perhaps that’s because the room was lit only by work lights during our visit. Gone with the floor and wall was the original plaster ceiling, so the permanent room lighting was on hiatus. A suspended ceiling will replace the original.

Speaking of that plaster ceiling, workers found “a lot of stuff” — abandoned materials — concealed by the old ceiling, says Paul Farnsworth. The stuff included wiring for two previous sets of lights, notes Farnsworth, the Facility Services project manager for this and several other room makeovers this summer.

Other evidence of past civilizations was revealed by removing the wooden tiered floor, which had covered a concrete subfloor. Farnsworth and the renovation team had expected to find a disused HVAC opening, which they plugged with concrete. But there was another artifact that came as a surprise.

And here’s Carnegie 339 about a week earlier. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

That was a fire suppression system designed to flood the space under the raised floor in case of a blaze. The component pipes and sprinkler heads — still hooked up — were a surprise to the construction team, as they didn’t appear on any plans and a hatch providing access to them had been blocked off by earlier renovations.

“Fortunately we didn’t damage them when we took the tiered floor out,” Farnsworth says. He adds, “It took a little detective work” to trace back the plumbing that fed the system.

Another vestige of the past will remain in Room 339, albeit concealed. An I-beam is mounted above the space where the instructor’s counter used to be, presumably to hang heavy apparatus from. The beam will stay when the drop ceiling is installed.

Awaiting “node chairs” and whiteboards is Carnegie 225, one of two refitted active-learning classrooms in the science building. The room is seen from a corridor through a new window intended to impart a sense of spaciousness. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

If anyone needs to use it, Farnsworth says, it will be easy to push aside a couple of ceiling tiles to expose and make use of it. “They went to a lot of effort to put it there.”

The structural reconfiguration included the creation of a new main entrance. That doorway is now aligned with the corridor wall, in contrast to the wacky angle of its previous orientation. Because the room’s seating capacity has been reduced, from 53 to 36, the building code also permitted the walling-over of a secondary side entrance.

Farnsworth notes that the wallboard has been hung and primed, and the wiring rough-ins are complete. Finish painting is underway this week, and the new ceiling will be hung soon.

A faculty office in the new neuroscience center in Hathorn Hall. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

Completion of the other active-learning classroom, Room 225, is on hold until late this month, at which point whiteboards will be placed around the walls and furniture moved in. In July, a window was cut in a wall to make the room seem more spacious; college designers are now working on a translucent film to stick on the glass and minimize visual distractions from the corridor.

Hathorn Hall is also on Farnsworth’s summer chore list. Essentially complete is the conversion of a large common space for emeriti faculty on the ground floor to a center for neuroscience. Enjoying serene, big-windowed offices in Hathorn since Aug. 1 are neuroscience professors Jason Castro, Nancy Koven, and a new member of the neuro faculty, Michelle Greene.

A fourth room has been remade as Greene’s lab, which includes two isolation booths, and christened the ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ Computational Vision Lab. (Martin Kruse, another new hire and a joint appointment between bio and neuro, is quartered in Carnegie.)

Christened the ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ Computational Vision Lab, neuroscientist Michelle Greene’s new neuroscience lab in Hathorn Hall includes two isolation rooms. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

Finally in Hathorn, the math computer lab in Room 207 has been upgraded to meet the burgeoning campus demand for desktop computers. Along with new paint, furniture, audiovisual gear, and ceiling, the room was outfitted with 21 new Dells — an increase of six from the previous allotment.

As in Carnegie 339, here too the renovators found a surprise above the old ceiling, which in this case was a suspended one. The surprise was soot that had flaked off a wooden beam scorched in some long-ago fire — perhaps the 1881 belfry fire that threatened ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½’ library, which was housed in Hathorn at the time. (Students living in Parker Hall got the books out of harm’s way.)

The lab was also upgraded to CAT 6, or Category 6, computer networking cable, which puts the facility on a par with any computer lab at ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½. The old cabling, says Farnsworth, “was kind of slow for math.”

Can we talk? Campus Construction Update welcomes your questions, reminiscences, and comments about facility improvements. Please email newswriter Doug Hubley, stating “Construction Updateâ€� or “Are you, too, kind of slow for math?” in the subject line.

Fresh concrete plugs a disused HVAC opening in the subfloor of Carnegie 339. The sign covered the hole while the concrete was soft. (Doug Hubley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

Got some house painting to do this summer? So does ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½.

And where better to begin than at the beginning, with the college’s oldest building, Hathorn Hall (1857).

Giles Giguere of Higgins Custom Painting in Lewiston works on removing 60 layers of paint from the columns of Hathorn Hall. Mike Bradley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College.

Giles Giguere of Higgins Custom Painting in Lewiston works to strip 60 layers of paint from the columns of Hathorn Hall. Mike Bradley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College.

Beneath 60 layers of paint lies the "original substrate" of Hathorn's columns: Southern yellow pine. Mike Bradley/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College.

With more than 60 layers of old paint, the Hathorn columns needed far more than a fresh coat. This time, ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ would start over with what Dan Sands, carpentry, paint and masonry services manager at ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½, calls “the original substrate.â€�

Bare wood. Southern yellow pine, to be specific.

Enter Giles Giguere of Higgins Custom Painting in Lewiston, who will apply coats of Peel Away 1, a paint remover that’s corrosive while wet, but environmentally friendly when dry.

He’ll cover each treated section with a special laminate paper for 24 hours, “so it gets good and saturated,� says Giguere. When the paper is lifted, off comes the paint.

Well, some of it comes off. He’ll repeat the process three times on each section, then wash the bare columns with water and treat the wood with Citri-Lize, a neutralizing agent.

After the columns get a good sanding, the Higgins team will apply at least one coat of oil-based primer followed by two coats of semi-gloss acrylic exterior finish paint to match Lane Hall’s columns, which received the same treatment in 2011.

Weather permitting, stripping and painting Hathorn’s columns and doing trim work around the east and west entrances will take six to eight weeks.

“The way ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ is, you want everything looking good,â€� Sands says.

A new genre of presidential letters, memos, columns, and blogs has sprung up on most college campuses in response to the ongoing global financial turmoil.

Demonstrating a greater sense of accountability and transparency than ever before, higher education leaders offer different details but all try to balance two messages. On one hand, we speak with both urgency and candor about budget cuts, sacrifices, and contingency plans. On the other hand, we reassure our stakeholders that we will not only survive this crisis but use it to grow stronger, with core values intact.

I have thus far contributed three letters to this outpouring. Each letter emphasizes how our response to rough economic seas is rooted in the character of the College. ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ is prepared by longstanding habits of heart and mind to economize and to be entrepreneurial, and our efforts are as always collective and sustained.

In the most immediate term, it’s all hands on deck to control costs, maintain revenues, and balance our fiscal 2009–10 budget in the face of diminished endowment performance.

This is not new or unwelcome work here; sound fiscal management has earned ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ a reputation for academic excellence that far outstrips our financial resources. Every department is pursuing greater frugality on the operations side, for example, through a Cost-Saving Initiative piloted by our Department of Human Resources.

We still plan to invest now in faculty excellence and financial aid. Planning for the next phase of the Campus Facilities Master Plan is getting under way, as we look to future improvements that will be critical to our educational excellence, including space for residential life, for research and teaching in the sciences, and for athletics and wellness.

On the revenue side, we have seen an enormous growth in the culture of philanthropy at ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½. We have a robustly emerging habit of asking for and receiving your support to keep ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ strong for future generations. In the short term, we are focusing fundraising efforts on the ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ Fund, whose revenue makes up about 5 percent of the annual operating budget. New and better ways for those who care about ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ to give of their time are also in the offing.

For the longer term, thinking and acting strategically have never been more critical, and we know the ropes here, too. Through multiyear budget planning we have a tool for considering multiple scenarios and giving serious thought to an array of options. Following up on the institutional planning work that began last year, three faculty/staff teams are now developing strategic initiatives focused on:

• the innovative learning agenda at ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½, enhancing the student experience as well as faculty teaching and scholarship;
• the natural sciences and mathematics, strengthening both curricular and physical infrastructure;
• the arts at ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ and in the community, extending the reach and visibility of our creative campus.

Around each initiative we will implement short- and middle-term projects by redeploying existing resources and by fundraising. Looking out further, our planning process will help us monitor what is changing in the environment and how we can respond now to be ready for the future.

Lasting change grows organically from the strengths of a culture, as its champions embrace the possibilities always inherent in the challenges. This college has never grown accustomed to plain sailing. The first president mortgaged his house to meet debts related to the institution, which in its infancy could easily have succumbed without the financial support of both Sunday school children and philanthropists like Benjamin E. ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½.

As Professor Emeritus of History Jim Leamon ’55 notes, early ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ students “found moral advantage in their hardscrabble reputation.â€� At the same time, President Cheney believed in and worked for nothing less than a grand concept. Raising money to build Hathorn and Parker, he reminded the leading citizens of Lewiston that smaller facilities would suffice for an ordinary school but not for an institution intended “for coming time.â€�

During the Great Depression, ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ never cut faculty or staff, nor ran deficits. Reacting to increased competition for students and their greater needs, ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ doubled its financial aid over a six-year period early in the decade and increased its spending on recruitment later in the decade. In 1936, Harry Rowe ’12, the longtime lieutenant to ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ presidents, summed up the ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ philosophy: “A holding-our-own policy will not do.â€�

In 2009 we will draw on these inspirational ancestors even as we look forward, not backward, and we will call on our entire community of talented faculty, dedicated staff, ambitious students, and generous supporters.

By Elaine Tuttle Hansen