The University of Illinois - Champaign Urbana: From 1998

[aaron38]

I found these photographs I took while I was in college and decided to scan and post them. I discovered two things. I had a crapy camera, and apparently I had no idea how to frame a shot.

This was a quiet morning after finals, the day before graduation. It was my farewell walk around campus, saying goodbye to the University, my home. In two days I was leaving for Chicago.

It's strange. Looking back at these photos, U of I still feels more like home than Chicago, even though I've now been out of college twice as long as I was in it.
If any prospective Freshmen are considering U of I, go there, you won't regret it.
Anyway, enjoy the scenes of a college campus, on a quiet morning in May, 1998.


The Alma Mater says "Welcome!"
http://i142.photobucket.com/albums/r86/aaron38/U%20of%20I%20May-98/scan0001.jpg

Altgeld Hall. Law building turned Math building.
http://i142.photobucket.com/albums/r86/aaron38/U%20of%20I%20May-98/scan0002.jpg

http://i142.photobucket.com/albums/r86/aaron38/U%20of%20I%20May-98/scan0003.jpg

http://i142.photobucket.com/albums/r86/aaron38/U%20of%20I%20May-98/scan0004.jpg

http://i142.photobucket.com/albums/r86/aaron38/U%20of%20I%20May-98/scan0007.jpg

http://i142.photobucket.com/albums/r86/aaron38/U%20of%20I%20May-98/scan0006.jpg


The Main Quad. In my opinion, it's one of the most beautiful places on Earth.
It's also good for frisbee.
http://i142.photobucket.com/albums/r86/aaron38/U%20of%20I%20May-98/scan0005.jpg

http://i142.photobucket.com/albums/r86/aaron38/U%20of%20I%20May-98/scan0008.jpg

http://i142.photobucket.com/albums/r86/aaron38/U%20of%20I%20May-98/scan0012.jpg

http://i142.photobucket.com/albums/r86/aaron38/U%20of%20I%20May-98/scan0013.jpg

http://i142.photobucket.com/albums/r86/aaron38/U%20of%20I%20May-98/scan0009.jpg

Foellinger Auditorium
http://i142.photobucket.com/albums/r86/aaron38/U%20of%20I%20May-98/scan0010.jpg

Davenport Hall
http://i142.photobucket.com/albums/r86/aaron38/U%20of%20I%20May-98/scan0011.jpg

http://i142.photobucket.com/albums/r86/aaron38/U%20of%20I%20May-98/scan0014.jpg

The underground Undergrad Library
http://i142.photobucket.com/albums/r86/aaron38/U%20of%20I%20May-98/scan0016.jpg

http://i142.photobucket.com/albums/r86/aaron38/U%20of%20I%20May-98/scan0017.jpg

http://i142.photobucket.com/albums/r86/aaron38/U%20of%20I%20May-98/scan0018.jpg

http://i142.photobucket.com/albums/r86/aaron38/U%20of%20I%20May-98/scan0019.jpg

The Main Library
http://i142.photobucket.com/albums/r86/aaron38/U%20of%20I%20May-98/scan0020.jpg

http://i142.photobucket.com/albums/r86/aaron38/U%20of%20I%20May-98/scan0015.jpg

You can never find a parkingspot on class days.
http://i142.photobucket.com/albums/r86/aaron38/U%20of%20I%20May-98/scan0021.jpg

http://i142.photobucket.com/albums/r86/aaron38/U%20of%20I%20May-98/scan0022.jpg

Illini Union Bookstore - I spent way too much money there
http://i142.photobucket.com/albums/r86/aaron38/U%20of%20I%20May-98/scan0023.jpg

http://i142.photobucket.com/albums/r86/aaron38/U%20of%20I%20May-98/scan0024.jpg

Psych Building
http://i142.photobucket.com/albums/r86/aaron38/U%20of%20I%20May-98/scan0025.jpg

ISR - My home for two years. I lived in Townsend.
http://i142.photobucket.com/albums/r86/aaron38/U%20of%20I%20May-98/scan0043.jpg

I can see my old window
http://i142.photobucket.com/albums/r86/aaron38/U%20of%20I%20May-98/scan0044.jpg

The women had the good view
http://i142.photobucket.com/albums/r86/aaron38/U%20of%20I%20May-98/scan0045.jpg

The men's Side
http://i142.photobucket.com/albums/r86/aaron38/U%20of%20I%20May-98/scan0046.jpg

The Krannert Performing Arts Center. An amazing piece of architecture. Almost the whole structure is underground. The towers you see are the lofts above the stages for the backdrops. The entire roof is plazas open to the public.
http://i142.photobucket.com/albums/r86/aaron38/U%20of%20I%20May-98/scan0048.jpg

http://i142.photobucket.com/albums/r86/aaron38/U%20of%20I%20May-98/scan0049.jpg

http://i142.photobucket.com/albums/r86/aaron38/U%20of%20I%20May-98/scan0050.jpg

The open air amphitheatre on the roof of Krannert. It's acoustically perfect. If you stand in the middle and speak softly, everyone can hear you.
It's mostly a late night makeout spot.
http://i142.photobucket.com/albums/r86/aaron38/U%20of%20I%20May-98/scan0051.jpg

The roof has nice views
http://i142.photobucket.com/albums/r86/aaron38/U%20of%20I%20May-98/scan0052.jpg

http://i142.photobucket.com/albums/r86/aaron38/U%20of%20I%20May-98/scan0053.jpg

Chemical and Life Sciences Building
http://i142.photobucket.com/albums/r86/aaron38/U%20of%20I%20May-98/scan0055.jpg

http://i142.photobucket.com/albums/r86/aaron38/U%20of%20I%20May-98/scan0054.jpg

They needed to preserve one of the main walkways into the Quad
http://i142.photobucket.com/albums/r86/aaron38/U%20of%20I%20May-98/scan0056.jpg

http://i142.photobucket.com/albums/r86/aaron38/U%20of%20I%20May-98/scan0057.jpg

The joys of socialized medicine
http://i142.photobucket.com/albums/r86/aaron38/U%20of%20I%20May-98/scan0058.jpg

Down Lincoln to Florida Ave Residence Halls
http://i142.photobucket.com/albums/r86/aaron38/U%20of%20I%20May-98/scan0059.jpg

They don't call it F.A.R. for nothing
http://i142.photobucket.com/albums/r86/aaron38/U%20of%20I%20May-98/scan0060.jpg

Illini Grove, on the way
http://i142.photobucket.com/albums/r86/aaron38/U%20of%20I%20May-98/scan0061.jpg

FAR
http://i142.photobucket.com/albums/r86/aaron38/U%20of%20I%20May-98/scan0062.jpg

http://i142.photobucket.com/albums/r86/aaron38/U%20of%20I%20May-98/scan0063.jpg


Back to the north side. North of Green, engineering land.

Everitt Lab, the Electrical Engineering Building - Many, many hours spent inside.
http://i142.photobucket.com/albums/r86/aaron38/U%20of%20I%20May-98/scan0026.jpg

http://i142.photobucket.com/albums/r86/aaron38/U%20of%20I%20May-98/scan0028.jpg

Engineering Hall
http://i142.photobucket.com/albums/r86/aaron38/U%20of%20I%20May-98/scan0027.jpg

The (then) brand new Engineering Quad. Trees were still just getting started.
http://i142.photobucket.com/albums/r86/aaron38/U%20of%20I%20May-98/scan0029.jpg

Boneyard creek
http://i142.photobucket.com/albums/r86/aaron38/U%20of%20I%20May-98/scan0031.jpg

Granger Engineering Library. Way too many hours spent inside.
http://i142.photobucket.com/albums/r86/aaron38/U%20of%20I%20May-98/scan0030.jpg

http://i142.photobucket.com/albums/r86/aaron38/U%20of%20I%20May-98/scan0032.jpg

Kenney Gym - The last remnant of the old athletic fields where the north quad is now.
http://i142.photobucket.com/albums/r86/aaron38/U%20of%20I%20May-98/scan0034.jpg

Digital Computer Lab - A frankenstein Building. What you see is the new building, built as a shell around the old building, which is still in there. They designed it to look kind of like an IC.
http://i142.photobucket.com/albums/r86/aaron38/U%20of%20I%20May-98/scan0033.jpg

To the North Quad
http://i142.photobucket.com/albums/r86/aaron38/U%20of%20I%20May-98/scan0036.jpg

Beckman Institute - PhD land
http://i142.photobucket.com/albums/r86/aaron38/U%20of%20I%20May-98/scan0038.jpg

http://i142.photobucket.com/albums/r86/aaron38/U%20of%20I%20May-98/scan0037.jpg

This is a cool astronomical fountain.
http://i142.photobucket.com/albums/r86/aaron38/U%20of%20I%20May-98/scan0039.jpg

At noon on the Summer soulstice, the shadow of the needle will fall on the closest round fountain. At the Spring and Fall equinox, the shadow falls on the middle fountain. At the Winter soulstice the shadow falls on the farthest fountain (closest to us)
http://i142.photobucket.com/albums/r86/aaron38/U%20of%20I%20May-98/scan0040.jpg

At night, if you look through the hole in the ball to the top of the needle, you see the North Star
http://i142.photobucket.com/albums/r86/aaron38/U%20of%20I%20May-98/scan0041.jpg


That's only half the campus, but the end of my photos.
Go Illini!

[OhioGuy]

Nice. I always enjoy threads showcasing university campuses. :)

[rs913]

Nice campus. And since it can't be said enough...Go Illini, beat USC in the Rose Bowl (please!)

[cbotnyse]

Thanks for the photos! I was a freshman here back in 1998 and loved it.

[themapman]

Just finished my masters there this spring....nice campus, nice town, good school.

[ColDayMan]

Thanks!

[Wheelingman04]

I have always wondered what that school looked like. I like it. Nice, comprehensive set of photos.

[4orty4th]

campus quad are the best ... and are the perfect models for functional "urban" squares. Why is it we don't see more urban designers emulating them?
Because we should.

[edsg25]

campus quad are the best ... and are the perfect models for functional "urban" squares. Why is it we don't see more urban designers emulating them?
Because we should.

and the U of I mall is one of the most spectacular such open spaces of any US campus. This is a space so precious that when the library was being expanded (BTW...U of I has the largest public univ lib in the nation and third biggest behind Harvard and Yale) in the mall, it was sunk underground.

[Saguaro]

Something that has always confused me: if the city is called "Champaign Urbana", why is the campus "UI Urbana-Champaign"?

[edsg25]

aaron, you probably don't know this, but the outdoor amphitheatre at Krannert looks like it was ripped out from the upper level plaza of UIUC's little brother, UIC, and transported to C/U...there were four such structures on the top of the lecture center and one big one between them...all were torn down when the campus got rid of the upper level connections.

at any rate, they looked just like your picture here.

[aaron38]

and the U of I mall is one of the most spectacular such open spaces of any US campus. This is a space so precious that when the library was being expanded (BTW...U of I has the largest public univ lib in the nation and third biggest behind Harvard and Yale) in the mall, it was sunk underground.

Well the Freshmen are always told that the library's underground so that the Morrow Plots weren't shaded. But yes, it is part of the mall, although with Foellinger there, I don't think it would have mattered that much if it was above ground. I never really considered that plaza part of the mall, as it's not on the Main Quad, and not really on the South Quad either.

What year were the UIC Amphitheatres torn down? Krannert was built in '66-'69.

[aaron38]

Something that has always confused me: if the city is called "Champaign Urbana", why is the campus "UI Urbana-Champaign"?

The city is Champaign-Urbana because Champaign is the larger of the two.

But the University is Urbana-Champaign because it was first founded in Urbana, the bulk of the campus is in Urbana, and they wanted the name to reflect that.

[themapman]

Something that has always confused me: if the city is called "Champaign Urbana", why is the campus "UI Urbana-Champaign"?

The city is Champaign-Urbana because Champaign is the larger of the two.

But the University is Urbana-Champaign because it was first founded in Urbana, the bulk of the campus is in Urbana, and they wanted the name to reflect that.

Plus most of the functional campus (not counting research fields and unused land owned by U of I) is in Urbana. I would estimate about 70% of the classroom buildings, and about 60% of the dorms, are in Urbana.

[edsg25]

and there would be a great chance that many of you would never have heard of Champaign if it wasn't the home of the only two structures on campus that the vast majority of you will ever see on t.v.:

Memorial Stadium and Assemly Hall.

Let's face it: it's the Illini that put Champaign on the map.

[gct13]

Very late on this thread, but thanks for scanning these in, nice thread!

[UrbanSophist]

I lived in Townsend as well.