18. The GEORGIA SCHOOL OF TECHNOLOGY, 

North Ave. between Williams and Luckie Sts., occupies a 55-acre campus in a section of Atlanta that is rapidly changing from residential to commercial. Along North Avenue old-fashioned frame dwellings, now serving as lodgings, are interspersed with small shops that cater to student trade. Near the south entrance of the campus the severely modern brick buildings of a housing project replace a former slum region, while to the west is the distant smoke of factories and railroad yards. The entire scene is constantly animated by the life of the students—in blue and khaki uniforms hurrying to the drill field, or with levels, rods, and chains busily absorbed in surveying the campus plots and adjacent streets. Several gayly painted "jalopies" usually stand at the curbs, bearing on their sides lopsided letters spelling out words of the school song "I'm a ramblin' wreck from Georgia Tech,"

Grouped compactly within this area, the 32 buildings are dominated by the administration building, conspicuous for its tall spire with the word TECH emblazoned in electric lights on all four faces. The older halls are plain red-brick structures with little adornment, but the newer ones, designed by faculty members of the architectural department, have limestone trim and other decorative details in Collegiate Gothic style.

This institution, maintained by State appropriations, tuition fees, and the income from a $574,000 endowment, is the technological school of the University System of Georgia. Courses leading to bachelors degrees are offered in aeronautical, ceramic, chemical, civil, electrical, general, mechanical, public health, and textile engineering and also in architecture, chemistry, and industrial management. In addition the college grants masters' degrees in architecture and in aeronautical, ceramic, chemical, civil, electrical, and textile engineering. The graduate department, which was organized in 1922, is still small. During the year 1939-40, the school registered only 41 graduate students but had 3,767 undergraduates, including those in the evening and summerschools. The faculty numbered 165 professors, 37 graduate assistants, and several student assistants.

The Co-operative Plan, introduced in 1912, permits students to co-ordinate theory and practical experience. Those who are accepted in this department spend alternate quarters of five entire years attending school and working in such industrial firms as construction, railroad, and electrical companies and with such manufacturing plants as steel, textile, and paper mills. Degrees are offered in chemical, civil, electrical, mechanical, and textile engineering, and students are fitted for positions in designing, production, and sales departments of industries in these engineering fields.

Extension work is conducted on the campus by the Evening School of Applied Science. This department, organized in 1908, offers two-year courses in various technical fields, including automobile engineering, building construction, heating, ventilating, and radio. Credits are not applicable toward a degree, but certificates are issued upon completion of the requirements.

The State Engineering Experiment Station, the engineering research unit of the university system, is operated on the campus and is affiliated with the various teaching departments. The purposes of this agency, which was founded in 1934, are to aid industry by developing the resources of the State, to integrate agricultural and industrial activities, and to support scientific research, both fundamental and applied, in the numerous university institutions. Here the varied facilities of numerous laboratories and the services of technically trained men are available in an academic atmosphere. The studies are financed by the State in co-operation with private enterprises, government agencies, or technical foundations, and the results are made public through bulletins and circulars. During the school year 1939-40, experiments were conducted on such problems as the more efficient processing of cotton, analysis of the proper types of industry for Georgia and the Southeast, the development of a new kind of aircraft, the finding of new uses for pecan oil, improvements of the properties of rayon, and the processing of domestic flax to suit cotton mill methods.

Both a military and a naval unit of the Reserve Officers' Training Corps are maintained at the Georgia School of Technology. The army unit, established here in 1920, is the successor of the Citizens Military Training Corps, which was organized as a war measure in 1917. The War Department provides a staff of officers and equipment for instruction in four divisions—infantry, artillery, signal corps, and ordnance; these courses in military science and tactics are more extensive than those offered at any other school in the State. Georgia Tech was among the six colleges selected by the Navy Department in 1926 for the establishment of Naval R.O.T.C. units to train students in navigation, seamanship, naval ordnance and gunnery, and naval engineering. Enrollment in the naval unit is limited, and graduates may receive appointments as Ensign in the Supply Corps of the U.S. Navy or as Second Lieutenant, U.S. Marine Corps.

In addition to the physical equipment of the laboratories and shops, five engineering departments have reading rooms where books and magazines of special technical significance are kept. Writings of a more general nature are housed in the main library. In all, the college possesses 45,000 bound volumes, 5,000 unbound pamphlets, and many periodicals.

An informal collegiate atmosphere prevails in the writing and editing of four publications: the Technique, a weekly newspaper; the Yellow Jacket, a monthly humorous magazine; the Georgia Tech Engineer, a serious magazine published four times during the school year; and the Blue Print, the college annual. A more professional attitude, however, predominates at the meetings of such local and Nation-wide technical organizations as the Architectural Society, the American Society of Civil Engineers, the American Institute of Chemical Engineers, and the American Ceramic Society. The college chapters of these associations meet frequently to hear prominent lecturers, to see motion pictures on technical subjects, to make inspection tours of industrial plants, to plan displays, or to entertain practicing engineers.

Sports, under the supervision of the Georgia Tech Athletic Association, occupy a prominent place in student life. Since intramural and intercollegiate contests are scheduled in many sports, including tennis, swimming, fencing, golf, track, rifle shooting, baseball, basketball, and football, more than 50 per cent of the Tech men participate in some form of exercise. The sport best known outside the college halls is football. Tech's football team, the Yellow Jackets, has steadily increased its popularity since its organization in 1893 by Leonard Wood, student and coach, and has distinguished itself in games throughout the United States. After the successful 1928 season, the Tech team defeated the University of California in the Rose Bowl game at Pasadena on New Year's day. The 1939 season culminated in an invitation to play in the Orange Bowl at Miami, where Tech defeated the University of Missouri in the New Year's Day game.

Georgia Tech was founded in that period when the general cry for industrialization was finding a response in the establishment of engineering schools in all parts of the Nation. A need for such a school in Georgia, first voiced by W.T. Hanson, editor of the Macon Telegraph and Messenger, was also ardently advocated by Henry W. Grady in the Atlanta Constitution. As a result, N.E. Harris of Macon, later governor of Georgia, introduced before the legislature a resolution to consider the establishment of a technical school in Georgia. This resolution was passed on November 24, 1882, and Governor Alexander H. Stephens immediately appointed a commission of ten men to visit and study the leading engineering schools of the United States. On the recommendation of the committee the general assembly in 1885 appropriated $65,000 for the establishment of the Georgia School of Technology.

One of five competing cities, Atlanta made the high bid of $130,000 in land and money for the site of the new school. Professor M.P. Higgins, of the Worcester Polytechnic Institute, was engaged to supervise the organization, and in 1887 construction of the first buildings was begun on a five-acre tract purchased from the Peters Land Company. Later Richard Peters donated an additional tract of four acres. Dr. Isaac Stiles Hopkins, who had instituted the first technological course in the South at Emory College in 1884, was chosen the first president. School was opened on October 3, 1888, with 84students, and four days later formal installation services were held at DeGive's Opera House on Marietta Street.

Growth was steady from the beginning. After the first eight years, during which the only degree offered was that of mechanical engineering, other courses were added to the curriculum with the aid of State appropriations, private endowments, and gifts from scientific foundations. When textile engineering was introduced in 1899 and ceramic engineering in 1924, these were the first such courses in the South. A period of rapid expansion followed the Greater Tech Campaign of 1920, when funds were raised for buildings and equipment. The buildings program was accelerated during the 1930's by funds from the various Federal public works agencies.

In 1931 the general assembly passed a law requiring the reorganization of the State institutions of higher learning and the creation of the University System of Georgia. During that year the school lost its individual board of trustees and a few courses in business and commerce that were duplicated at the State University. Since January 1, 1932, when the measure became effective, the control of the Georgia School of Technology, like that of all the State colleges, has been vested in a central board of regents, appointed by the governor.

The Guggenheim School of Aeronautics Building, corner North Ave. and Cherry St., is constructed of red brick with concrete trim, its facade ornamented with figures of Pegasus, the winged mythological horse, and of the American eagle. In the building are an exhibit room and a drafting room for the designing of model aircraft, a machine and woodworking shop for construction, and laboratories, including two wind tunnels, for testing. The course in aeronautical engineering, the only one in the South, is open only to students who have received a degree in civil, electrical, general, or mechanical engineering. It was added to the curriculum in 1930 with the aid of a grant of $300,000 from the Daniel Guggenheim Fund for the Promotion of Aeronautics. The founding was the result of a previous survey made by Emory Land, a United States naval aeronautics authority, who was the vice president of the foundation. Because of its high scholastic standards, Georgia Tech was chosen from 27 Southern colleges and universities for the location of the school.

Brittain Hall, on Techwood Drive between North Ave. and Third St., was completed in 1928 and dedicated to Marion Luther Brittain, who has been president of the Georgia School of Technology since 1922. With its square central tower and loggia with pointed arches, this structure shows a more marked Gothic influence than the other buildings on the campus. It is set well back on a deep lawn and is flanked by dormitories placed almost flush with the sidewalk. The interior of the dining hall with its high gabled ceiling reflects the architectural style of the exterior. A large four-pointed stained-glass window of Tudor design in the right wing contains 14 panels, symbolizing the various activities of the school. The design, chosen from plans submitted by the graduating class of 1928, was made by Julian Harris, who has since achieved distinction as a sculptor and become a faculty member of the department of architecture. The panels were executed by the J. and R. Lamb Studios of New York.

Grant Field, corner North Ave. and Techwood Drive, is the major athletic arena of the Georgia Tech campus. Here in the fall, the Yellow Jackets meet the teams of rival colleges and universities to the accompaniment of frenzied cheering and the music of bands. The games played here every alternate year with the "Bull Dogs" of the University of Georgia are of unusual local interest because of the intense traditional rivalry between these two leading schools of the university system. Here, also, the churches hold Easter sunrise services and the city schools present pageants. Charles Lindbergh spoke here October 11, 1928; Winston Churchill on February 23, 1932; and Franklin Roosevelt on November 291 1935. The field, 800 feet long and 400 feet wide, is named in honor of Hugh Inman Grant, the son of John W. Grant, who made possible the purchase of the tract. The U-shaped stadium, completed in 1925 at a cost of about $350,000, seats more than 30,000 spectators.

The Naval Armory (open daily 9-4 during school term), SW. corner Techwood Drive and Third St., is headquarters for the R.O.T.C. Naval Unit, the Atlanta Naval Reserve Unit, and the Georgia Tech Athletic Association, The two-story main hall, which is 196 feet long and 60 feet wide, is equipped with a complete ship's bridge for instruction in steering and compass computation and with various instruments for training in seamanship and naval warfare. In the entrance hall hangs a print in low relief of the frigate Constitution, which was framed in the woodworking shop with timber from the original boat.

This structure, completed in 1934, is a severely plain rectangular building of two stories, stuccoed to blend with the adjacent stadium. A four-foot bronze eagle in a niche above the entrance once formed a part of the massive figurehead on the bow of the U.S.S. Georgia, a battleship built in 1906 and scrapped as a result of the 1921 Washington Disarmament Conference. The grilled doors were designed by Julian Harris and made from the heavy bronze scrollwork originally attached to the eagle. On the lawn, across the driveway to the right of the building, hangs a bell, also from the battleship Georgia, Two four-inch cannon that stood for several years on the lawn were removed in 1941, to be used in arming United States merchant ships.

The Auditorium-Gymnasium, facing Third St. between Techwood Drive and Fowler St., is constructed of reinforced concrete to harmonize with both stadium and armory. The sharp modern lines of the facade are relieved only by ornamental concrete grilles above the double doors, which open onto a terrace a few steps above the street level. The auditorium is used for commencement exercises and the student lecture series, which is open to the general public. When the removable seats are stored beneath the permanent spectators galleries along each side, a gymnasium floor is provided for contests in basketball, fencing, and badminton. A wing on the south side contains a large tile swimming pool and also a spectators gallery.

Laboratory work in process in many of the departments is of interest to the technically trained. In the Ceramics Building are exhibited the various clays native to Georgia and wares that have been made from them.

Contents