[1680] in Discussion of MIT-community interests
[Mit-talk] Cashier's Office mural going away
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (John Hawkinson)
Tue Dec 13 19:19:07 2005
Date: Tue, 13 Dec 2005 19:18:47 -0500
From: John Hawkinson <jhawk@mit.edu>
To: mit-talk@mit.edu
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[ My goodness. I spent a few hours this afternoon looking into the
issue of the Dollar Bill mural on the Cashier's Office, as a Tech
reporter, and I just came out of an hour meeting with Phil Walsh of
CAC to find 30 messages in my mailbox on the same topic. Whoa. ]
So this message is an attempt to reply to threads on ec-discuss,
senior-house, random-hall-talk, and sponge-talk. I will forward
this message to those lists, but I think mit-talk is a list that
it makes more sense to have discussion on.
Milo Martinez <milo@MIT.EDU> wrote on Tue, 13 Dec 2005
at 17:27:09 -0500 in <p0610050dbfc4fa406897@[18.238.5.211]>:
> Have you seen that guy camped out near lobby 10 taking pics of the
> dollar bill lately? Well, I over heard him talking, and he's doing it
> because the mural is being taken down. This is more than likely part
> of that student lounge space they want to create there.
Yes, that is correct.
According to Ruth Davis, who handles communications for Facilities,
the Cashier's Office dollar bill mural was planned to be removed near
the end of this week, but it may very well get pushed to next week
because of scheduling issues.
Facilities' project manager for the work is Gordon King, to whom
I have not yet spoken.
I met with Phil Walsh this afternoon from 5:30pm to 6:30pm,
talking about this and other space changes on campus.
As reported in The Tech, most recently,
"http://www-tech.mit.edu/V125/N34/cashiers.html", the process to
design how to use that space has been in the works for some time, as
early as last spring. As of September, it was still up in the air
whether the mural would be preserved.
The Class of 2005 has designated the renovation of that space as
student space as their class gift, in the form of a community lounge.
A committee was appointed by Chancellor Phil Clay to look into
the execution of the process. The committee consists of:
co-chairs:
Phil Walsh Head of Campus Activites Complex
Deborah Poodry Director of Campus Planning and Design
Tracy Purinton Assistant Dean for Student Activities
Andrew Lukman UA Senate Speaker
Ali Wyne UA Senate Vice Chair
John Velasco representative from the Class of 2005
as well as someone else whose name I don't have.
The committee mostly lay dormant since the spring, after deciding on
the high-level view of the space, but resumed work this term. The
Insitute's Committee for the Review of Space Planning (CRSP) approved
the general concept of a lounge last spring.
About two weeks ago, the committee made a final recommendation of a
plan which includes removing the mural and replacing it with glass
frontage on the infinite corridor, someone similar in concept to the
glass in the DMSE space at the east end of the corridor, or the
student services center/quickstation area at the building 11
intersection.
That recommendation is what we're seeing in action now.
Phil Walsh spent quite a while trying to explain to me the rationale
behind the committee's decision. Essentially the committee felt that
glass open space to the Infinite was an important part of the lounge
concept, and that it is rather difficult to preserve the mural
while maintaining that open space.
The intended plan of the glass wall is that it will stretch
horizontally just a bit past the two current doorways. This constraint
is because there are two vertical chases (ducts) that can't be moved
that are inside the current walls. Also, the doors will be replaced
with open doorways, to facilitate the community nature of the space.
Walsh indicated that the committee was well aware of the significance
of the dollar bill mural, and would try to include a nod to it in
their design. In particular, one thought was that one pane of glass in
the glass wall would be etched with a reduction of how the dollar bill
used to look, with some notes about the history of the bill, as well
as the fact that the space renovation was a result of the Class of
2005's gift.
That's basically my summary. I've tried to answer some of the questions
people asked below.
> Personally I would hate to see that mural go. It's part of MIT and
> Hacking History. Anyone know how long it's been there? The idea is to
Walsh suggested to me that it had been there since the mid-1970s,
but he was shaky on its exact history (and in fact was looking for
more information).
Milo Martinez <milo@MIT.EDU> wrote on Tue, 13 Dec 2005 at 17:44:15
-0500 in <p0610050ebfc4fec7780d@[18.238.5.211]>:
> No survey was ever done, but there was students on some committee.
That's not accurate. Kelsey Byers pointed out to me in e-mail that,
"People walking by the Bush Room were prodded indoors to talk with
admins and fill out a survey asking what the best purpose of the new
space was. The overwhelming majority of people I talked with there
(students and admins alike) were keen on a lounge, with about 50%
favoring removing the mural altogether or only keeping part of it and
50% favoring keeping it for old times' sake."
Edward L Platt <elplatt@MIT.EDU> wrote on Tue, 13 Dec 2005 at 18:18:08
-0500 in
<Pine.GSO.4.62L.0512131816270.28080@quickstation-bexley.mit.edu>:
> This is one of those "things that was decided a year ago without any
> student input and is probably to late to change." Although with that
> said, I'd sign a petition to keep it up.
The decision to remove the mural was a recent one.
The decision to make that space a lounge was made last spring.
I think you can argue that the decision to remove the mural was a
result of the decision to make the lounge one with open light, but
I don't think that decision was finalized until two weeks ago.
Solomon Bisker <sbisker@MIT.EDU> wrote on Tue, 13 Dec 2005 at 19:06:53
-0500 (EST) in <Pine.LNX.4.62L.0512131902580.10470@m2-225-11.mit.edu>:
| Does anyone know if it moved simply to make room for this lounge
| space, or did it move because the Cashier's office genuinely wanted
| to move?
The decision to move the Cashier's office was made as part of a
Controllers Accounting Office restructuring, and was not made on the
basis of what would fill that space (i.e. before a Class of 2005 gift
was decided upon). On the other hand, I'm sure the idea that the space
would be used "more effectively" was part of the decision to move
it. I think it related to many of the services there being less and
less used (e.g. MIT is moving more and more paychecks to direct
deposit, etc.).
--jhawk@mit.edu
John Hawkinson
+1 617 797 0250
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