Columbia Sites

The Columbia Municipal Airport was located on route 40, now Business Loop 70 West, when Highway 40 was one of the major east-west roads in the country. This hangar is now being used by the city of Columbia as a storage and repair facility for the Parks and Recreation Department. The original signage designating it as the Columbia Municipal Airport remains. The area to the north was the site of the airport and was improved as a PWA project. Currently the airport is part of the city parks department and includes a golf course, trails, picnic grounds and shelters, and...

Crowder Hall is another of the “White Campus” projects and was and is the home to the University ROTC program. It was named after Enoch Crowder, Professor of Military Science at MU.

Constructed by the PWA in 1939. Curtis Hall is on the main campus of the University of Missouri in Columbia. It was named after Winterton Curtis, Professor of Zoology who was one of the expert witnesses called to the Scopes “monkey” trial of 1925. The building was initially named the New Chemistry, then the BioChem building, and is now primarily used for genetics work.

Constructed by the PWA in 1938-40. The need for a hospital dedicated to diagnosing and treating cancer was envisioned in the early ‘30s and with the political support of Lloyd Stark and the work of Dr. Ellis Fischel of St. Louis, the plan was made to locate the state cancer in the center of the state on the main thoroughfare through the state at the time, US highway 40. Unfortunately, after all of the planning and before construction started, Dr. Fischel died in a car accident on business for the new hospital. The building is in the process of being repurposed...

The Ellis library was built in 1915. The PWA added this addition in 1935. The addition to the existing Ellis Library “provide urgently needed, usable, fire-proof, stack space for books, reading, seminar rooms, and other library facilities.” It is still heavily used including a large auditorium on the first floor.

Columbia College's Federal Hall was originally constructed as a New Deal post office building. When the post office moved to Walnut St, the building was converted into the Federal Building, then became the Youzeum, and now is the office for the nursing program at Columbia College. There were 2 murals for the post office that were moved from the post office to other locations over the time that the building was renovated to be the Federal Building. “Pony Express” was eventually moved to the City Council chambers. “Indians Watching Stagecoach in the Distance” was initially retrieved by the demolition team and...

The original part of this building dates to 1916, with the two sections flanking the central building being built in 1935.  Small, recent additions are at the north and south of the building.  This was a traditionally black school until integration of the Columbia Public Schools.  It is adjacent to the swimming pool in Douglass Park, a WPA project completed in about 1937.

Gentry Hall was constructed as a women’s dormitory, named after the second female graduate of the University of Missouri. This was part of the “women’s campus” on the east side of the MU campus and in contrast to how things are done now, there was a separation between the sites of the men’s and women’s dorms.

Gwynn Hall is immediately to the east of the Memorial Union, a memorial to students who fought in WW1. Gwynn Hall was built in 1922, but was not completed, in fact was a shell. It was completed by the PWA in 1936 and housed the Home Economics dept which moved there from the Niedermeyer Building in downtown Columbia that was and still is the oldest building in Columbia. It was dedicated in the same ceremony as Walter Williams Hall, Townsend Hall(the Education building), the Engineering Lab, Stephens Hall, and the large Northwest addition to Ellis Library and at the dedication...

Notes: The Jefferson Junior High Auditorium was Federal Public Works Project N. 3701, erected in 1934. It is a multi-use Auditorium for stage productions and sporting events, particularly basketball. The seating was replaced within the last 10 years, but there have been very few other changes to the physical structure of the building which is currently in active use by the Columbia Public Schools.

Robert E. Lee Elementary School was built as Federal Public Works Project # 3701 in 1934. The school is a three story building with a multi-purpose auditorium on the first floor with ornate reliefs surrounding the stage. The building was built to last and is currently in use as Lee Expressive Arts Elementary School, a magnet school in the heart of the city of Columbia. In February 2014, the school received a Most Notable Properties designation from the Columbia Historic Preservation Commission.

This deep red brick building was previously the post office for Columbia. With the construction of the new post office nearby, this building was remodeled by the Works Progress Administration (WPA) and housed the public library until the library moved to West Broadway and Garth Ave. The present iteration of this building is the home for the parks and recreation administration.

The National Guard Armory in Columbia was one of what was initially envisioned to be a large number of armories across the state, though the number actually built was limited. The building served as the home of the home of the Missouri National Guard until the last of the 20 th century. It presently houses the Ash St Sports complex for the Columbia Parks and Recreation Dept.

The New Deal funded an addition to Ridgeway Elementary in 1934.  While the plaque says the money came from a "Federal Public Works Project", that would be an early name for the Public Works Administration (PWA). The new eastern wing echoed the brick gothic design of the original building.     Ridgeway Elementary is today a magnet school for the Columbia area.

Named after E. Sydney Stephens, the University of Missouri's Stephens Hall was constructed by the PWA in 1935-36. The building now houses the biochemistry department.

Townsend Hall, originally called the Practice Building, is the home of the MU education department and when built, included the practice school and University High school. It was built with PWA funding in 1935-36.

Walter Williams Hall is on the northeast side of the University of Missouri and the arch is the main entry to the historical quad of buildings that are the oldest on the campus.The structures were constructed from 1935-37 with PWA funding and designed by architectural consultants Jamieson & Spearl. It is named after Walter Williams who was the creator of the first school of Journalism in 1908 and was the head of the Journalism School until 1930 when he became the president of the University of Missouri. The building was recently redone and still houses the school of Journalism.