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A collection of prominent individuals stood in line, scissors in hand. Among them, a trustee, an architect, a U.S. senator, an aerospace engineer, a major general.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
And an astronaut.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The date was May 19, 1969. Two months later, Edwin \u201cBuzz\u201d Aldrin Jr.<\/a>, encased in a spacesuit, would lumber across the lunar surface alongside Neil Armstrong as the first humans to set foot on the moon. But this day, Aldrin wore a jacket and tie to herald the opening of the library that honored the memory of the man who dreamed of making space travel possible: the late Robert Hutchings Goddard<\/a>, A.M. 1910, Ph.D. 1911, a Clark alumnus and physics<\/a> professor.<\/p>\n\n\n\n More than 3,000 spectators observed the proceedings from beneath green- and white-striped tents. Among the distinguished guests were Wernher von Braun, director of NASA\u2019s George C. Marshall Space Flight Center<\/a> in Huntsville, Ala., and Dr. Charles G. Abbot, the 97-year-old secretary emeritus of the Smithsonian Institution and Goddard\u2019s former mentor. Music by the Worcester Brass Band lent a festive air to the occasion.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The launch of this library was a big deal. In 1965, Congress had designated Clark University as the site for the National Memorial to Dr. Goddard, dubbed the Father of the Space Age. \u201cIt was not,\u201d Clark President Howard Jefferson would later write, \u201cby any means a local affair.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n The dedication ceremony was captured on radio and television, and in print, including filmed reports on the \u201cToday\u201d show and Walter Cronkite\u2019s CBS broadcast, a front-page story in The New York Times<\/em>, and stories and images in other major newspapers. Reporters from Newsweek<\/em> and Oggi<\/em> magazine, Italy\u2019s equivalent of Life<\/em>, were also present.<\/p>\n\n\n\n A convocation had been held earlier, with the participants proceeding from Atwood Hall to the greensward in front of the library. Honorary doctorates already had been conferred on three members of the ribbon-cutting team: U.S. Senator Edward M. Kennedy; J. Leland Atwood, aerospace engineer and president of North American Rockwell Corporation; and Aldrin, whose father, 1915 Clark alumnus Edwin Aldrin Sr.<\/a>, was in attendance. The 37-year-old Kennedy delivered the dedication address, fittingly, since his brother, President John F. Kennedy, had in 1961 committed the United States to landing a man on the moon, the culmination of Goddard\u2019s pioneering research.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In that same decade, as NASA<\/a> worked feverishly to launch the Apollo 11<\/a> moonshot, Clark had undertaken its own mission to complete its library. Like the Apollo journey, the endeavor required extensive collaboration, technical and professional expertise \u2014 and money.<\/p>\n\n\n\n On May 19, 1969, the Clark countdown ended.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The group wielded their scissors, made their snips, and the ribbon fell away.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u25ca\u25ca\u25ca<\/p>\n\n\n\n By the mid-1950s, Clark University was in trouble. President Jefferson, who had arrived on campus in 1946, later wrote of his fear that the university might be forced to close. Enrollment levels oscillated, first surging with the influx of GIs returning from World War II, then nosediving during the Korean War. By 1954, Clark had run up a significant deficit.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Beginning in 1958, the Clark University Development Council initiated a 30-month master plan to address the university\u2019s future. The study led to the creation of The Clark Program, whose 10-year mission was to raise $21.8 million for the construction of additional residential space and a new library. The existing neo-Gothic-style library, built in 1904 and 1909, consisted of what are now the Jefferson Academic Center and Geography Building. In addition to lacking adequate study space, it was deemed too small to accommodate the much-needed expansion of the book collection. A modern academic library was considered critical to Clark University\u2019s academic success.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Responsibility for the library rested with the Board of Trustees\u2019 Library Subcommittee, whose membership included faculty members; Esther Goddard, widow of Robert Goddard; university librarian Tilton M. Barron; and superintendent of buildings and grounds Robert E. Goodney. Trustee Alice C. Higgins<\/a> chaired the group. David L. Murphy, executive assistant to the president, was charged with raising $5.4 million for the library\u2019s design and construction.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In September 1963, the subcommittee unanimously selected architect John M. Johansen<\/a> of New Canaan, Conn., to design the library. The short list of distinguished architects vying for the honor had included I. M. Pei, who went on to design Boston\u2019s John Hancock Tower, and The Architects Collaborative, led by Bauhaus founder Walter Gropius, which had already been selected to design what would become the Fuller Quadrangle at Clark. That Johansen had designed only one library worked to his benefit \u2014 the subcommittee was open to a fresh and original approach.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Johansen\u2019s \u201cbrutalist<\/a>\u201d design proved polarizing. It was described as everything from \u201can exciting visual experience\u201d to \u201cthe superstructure of an ocean liner \u2014 going down.\u201d The architect himself likened it to \u201cthe rear of a Xerox copier\u201d and an assemblage of parts similar to \u201cbarnacles attaching themselves to a rock.\u201d In a good way.<\/p>\n\n\n\n According to Kristina Wilson<\/a>, professor of art history<\/a> at Clark, brutalism was a reaction to what architects like Johansen viewed as the sterility of steel-and-glass skyscrapers favored by big corporations. \u201cAll of these gleaming skyscrapers were unwelcoming to the messiness of human life,\u201d she says. \u201cBrutalism was an attempt to return to authenticity. The messiness of concrete and the authenticity of bricks were the materials that interested these architects.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Johansen, who worked closely with Tilton Barron, described the design process in a 1966 issue of Architectural Forum.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cI did not willfully \u2018design\u2019 this library,\u201d he wrote. \u201cRather, I presided and guided the building as it developed, letting it exercise its growing confidence and will and assert its purpose.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n The resulting 134,000-square-foot library would have the capacity to house 600,000 volumes (twice the number of the collection at the time), 915 spaces for individual and group study, and rooms designated for music collection and listening, art resources, and microtext reading.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The building\u2019s location on a low rise behind Jonas Clark Hall helped establish the library as a campus hub. It was elevated one story above grade level so as not to obstruct pedestrian pathways connecting various parts of campus, a decision that unintentionally created a wind-tunnel effect for those walking beneath the structure. Much was made of the fact that the library was located only about 300 feet from Goddard\u2019s laboratory.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The rocket pioneer\u2019s memory was preserved in a suite that housed the Goddard Exhibition Room, which told the story of his life, and the Goddard Collection<\/a> \u2014 materials given to Clark by Esther Goddard, including her husband\u2019s correspondence, diaries, and journals; patent applications and awards; and photographs and films of Goddard at work.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The booklet accompanying the 1969 dedication ceremony described the library\u2019s design as one intended \u201cto invoke a feeling of intellectual strength and a firm sense of mission, perhaps Dr. Goddard\u2019s most outstanding personal characteristics.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u25ca\u25ca\u25ca<\/p>\n\n\n\n Several events marking the library\u2019s progress kept it in the public spotlight.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Site preparation began in December 1965 with the demolition of three historic homes on the Clark campus, two of which dated from the 19th century: the red-brick Borger House, where Clark\u2019s first president, G. Stanley Hall<\/a>, resided until his retirement in 1920, and the President\u2019s Home, described as a classic example of \u201cCarpenter Gothic.\u201d Approximately 100 trees and shrubs were removed from the area and replanted or stored for future use.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Groundbreaking took place on Alumni Day, June 4, 1966. Those in attendance included the president of the National Space Club<\/a> in Washington, D.C., the director of NASA\u2019s Electronics Research Center<\/a>, and the director of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory<\/a> at the California Institute of Technology.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Five months later, on Oct. 12, shortly after the university had announced record student enrollment, a convocation was held to commemorate Robert Goddard. U.S. Vice President Hubert Humphrey, chairman of the National Aeronautics and Space Council<\/a>, delivered an address and dedicated a 300-pound stainless steel and aluminum time capsule.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Measuring 10 feet, four inches in length and built to survive 500 years underground, the capsule is a replica of a 1940 Goddard rocket. The capsule contains about 90 items and documents relating to Robert Goddard, the Space Age, contemporary life, and Clark University\u2019s history. They include 243 of Goddard\u2019s patents, dubbed by Von Braun as \u201cthe blueprints of the Space Age\u201d; a retrorocket from the first Apollo mission; the will of Clark\u2019s founder, Jonas G. Clark; and an assortment of objects that includes a miniskirt, a Beatles record, a Batman comic book, and a packet of filter-tip cigarettes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n A month before Goddard Library\u2019s dedication, The Report from Clark University announced that \u201cClark\u2019s literary heart has been successfully transplanted into a new ultra-modern body.\u201d Meticulous planning by Barron and his team was credited with the efficiency of the move. Within a space of two weeks, 300,000 books and periodicals were moved 100 yards from the shelves of the old library to those of the new. The report characterized the process as an \u201cintricate, complicated maneuver\u201d that \u201chad to be made in such a way that the free flow of books \u2014 essential to the university\u2019s academic life \u2014 was not seriously curtailed.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n On the same page of the report, it was announced that applications for the incoming 1969-1970 freshman class had reached an all-time high. From its postwar doldrums, now with a magnificent library and two new residence complexes (Fuller and Dana), Clark had repositioned itself as a modern university. Meanwhile, in a few months, the manned Apollo lunar landing would confirm the U.S. as the leader of the Space Age.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u25ca\u25ca\u25ca<\/p>\n\n\n\n Goddard Library\u2019s design earned accolades from a host of organizations like the U.S. Office of Education, the American Institute of Architects and Educational Facilities Laboratories, and College and University Business magazine. A panel of Central Massachusetts architects selected it as one of their favorite buildings. The Sept. 21, 1970, edition of TIME magazine featured the library in an article about campus architecture.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cWithout a doubt,\u201d says Kristina Wilson, \u201cthis was a moment when Clark\u2019s architecture was at the cutting edge of campus architecture nationwide.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Just as Goddard kept tweaking his rockets, the library that bears his name has required adjustments over the years, notably to repair the HVAC system. In 2008, the Boston-based architectural firm Perry Dean Rogers Partners completed a major renovation, which included enclosing the open area beneath the building and transforming it into the Academic Commons, an 11,000-square-foot space featuring a cafe\u0301 and spaces for study and quiet socializing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In her essay, \u201cThe Rear End of a Xerox: The Evolution of the Robert Hutchings Goddard Library,\u201d Madeleine Rozanski \u201912 wrote, \u201cBy giving the community an inviting space to gather, the AC fulfills the original goal for Goddard Library to be the centerpiece of the expanding campus.\u201d University Librarian Gwen Arthur<\/a> described the Academic Commons as \u201cthe ideal place for students and faculty to build our community of 21st-century scholars.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u25ca\u25ca\u25ca<\/p>\n\n\n\n![\"Goddard](\"https:\/\/www.clarku.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/37\/Goddard-Library-Dedication-5-19-1969-1.jpg\")
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