Historic Mount Allison: Memorial Library (1927-1970)

The idea of building a library as a memorial to the Mount Allison students who had died during the First World War was first proposed in 1917, in response to the need to rehouse the growing library collections maintained by the University and Ladies' College. [1] Fundraising for the Memorial Library began after the Armistice in 1918 but construction did not start until 1926. The formal opening took place on June 8, 1927.

Architect Andrew R. Cobb integrated the hallmarks of the Collegiate Gothic style into the Mount Allison campus by making use of the familiar red sandstone and olive trim. His design for the Memorial Library involved a main entrance through an ornate “Tudor-arched double door” covered by a crenellated-roofed porch, which led into the striking interior arrangement of the main staircase and luminous bay windows. [2] Upstairs, the main reading room featured a circulation desk and rows of tables surrounded by large windows under a high barrel-vaulted ceiling. The building also accommodated offices, quiet study rooms, the university archives, and a memorial hall where embossed plaques carried the names of the 73 fallen soldiers. These memorial tablets are now displayed on the main floor of the Wallace McCain Student Centre near the entrance to Tweedie Hall.

The Memorial Library soon had to adapt to the needs of a growing and changing university. At its completion in 1927, the book stacks held approximately 15,000 books. Two decades later it had already reached its capacity of 70,000 volumes, and grew to 100,000 volumes by 1960. [3] In dire need of an extension, Mount Allison enlisted the architectural firm of C.A. Fowler & Company, who by this time had contributed the designs for Trueman House, the Fourth Male Academy Building (Palmer Hall), and the Avard-Dixon building, among others. The new annex was built in the style of Modernism popular in the 1960s, which emphasized functional, minimalist form and the use of economical materials such as concrete, steel, and glass. It connected to the main body of the Memorial Library with a large atrium faced by patterned plates of glass. On one side, the annex was clad in familiar red sandstone to integrate it aesthetically into the surrounding campus. Other sides of the annex let their Modern influence show more clearly.

The annex expanded the library to include additional study rooms and doubled the stacks. It was named Tweedie Annex after Professor William Morley Tweedie and his sister Leora Tweedie. The opening took place on August 13, 1960. In 1961 a large wooden sculpture created by artist Anne Kahane was hung on the face of the annex near the entrance.

After the opening of the R. P. Bell Library in 1970, the Memorial Library building received extensive renovations to house the new University Centre. It reopened in March 1971 and was demolished in 2011.

Notes

[1] Reid, Mount Allison University: A History, vol. 2, p. 24

[2] Leroux & Holownia, A Vision of Wood and Stone, p. 83

[3] Leroux & Holownia, A Vision of Wood and Stone, p. 131-32