According to their Architects’ Roster submitted to the American Institute of Architects (AIA) in February 1953, the firm was a partnership between architects Theodore B. Wells and Myron Denbrook, Jr., with Wells being in sole proprietorship as an architect prior to entering into partnership in 1948. They were located at the Northern Hotel in Grand Forks, ND, which no longer exists, but was located in downtown at Fifth Avenue South and Kittson Avenue. Based upon a post on the Grand Forks Tornado of 1887, it appears that Wells’ father, Hugh N. Wells owned the Northern at one time.

The two men had interesting backgrounds, with Wells being the older of the pair, born in Grand Forks on September 8, 1889 and Denbrook was born on June 22, 1922 in Wayne County, Ohio. Wells attended school in town (though not specific, it is likely that he attended Grand Forks Central High School), then attended the University of North Dakota, and furthered his education in Paris. In contrast, Denbrook attended Ohio State University and earned his Bachelor of Architecture from the University of Washington in 1945. Based on both their educational backgrounds, they were experienced in their field and Denbrook working with Wells was potentially an early opportunity for him to gain experience and success.

Based upon years in practice and professional affiliation, Wells was likely the senior partner in the firm, as he had been a practicing architect since 1923 in Nebraska and had served as past president of the North Dakota Association of Architects. Denbrook commenced his practice in 1948 and both men were pending members in the AIA. Both men were active in the community, with Wells being involved in the Kiwanis Club, Chamber of Commerce, and the YMCA, while Denbrook was in the Lions Club. Wells also served in World War I with the 307th Engineers, attached to the 82nd Division, serving 22 months, with 13 in France.

In the section of the roster dedicated to the qualifications of the firm for membership in AIA, the men noted their firm’s “reputation for careful design.” They also noted the large volume of business in the region, with many jobs being for the same client. Further, their goal was “not to build monuments to ourselves, but to design functional, economical, yet beautiful buildings that represent the best buy for the money.” Based on the projects they listed up to 1953, they demonstrated working on several projects for one client, with several buildings on the University of North Dakota campus to their credit, including the Medical Science building (O’Kelly Hall), Education building, and the Engineering building. In addition, they worked on several public building projects throughout North Dakota and northern Minnesota, mostly schools, courthouses, and a few churches.

While they also have the Chester Fritz to their credit, they did face a few problems after building the CFL. The firm was involved in a legal dispute resulting from exterior problems relating to construction of the Kittson County (MN) court house in 1966, where exterior finish of Granolux began cracking. Details about this case can be found here

The style of the CFL did reflect some of the aims of the firm as it reflects an element of simplicity, yet strength. The building is not very ornate, excluding the tower, which has scholarly images carved into the concrete. It matches many of the buildings surrounding it, several which were designed or worked on by the firm. Based upon AIA directory records, Wells died in 1976 and Denbrook became the principal architect in the firm by the construction of the CFL.

When reflecting on the CFL and many other buildings on campus, it is clear that Wells & Denbrook were good at their craft and that this area was fortunate to have these architects working in Grand Forks.

The building, located at the corner of N 4th Street and 2nd Avenue North in Grand Forks will be having a small celebration, beginning at 3:30pm Wednesday, November 15 at its original entrance at 402 2nd Ave. N in downtown Grand Forks. Grand Forks Mayor Michael Brown will blow out candles on a birthday cake at 4:00pm.

This building is interesting not only for its architectural style, which is, according to the article, a classical revival style, but for a small plaque commemorating the explosion of the USS Maine in Havana, Cuba in February 1898. It is believed to be the only monument to that event in North Dakota and is made from metal from the ship. This is important, as the North Dakota militia served in the ensuing Spanish-American War, but in the Philippines, instead of Cuba, where they hoped to serve.

It has served numerous functions over the years, including a jail, and was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1982. The building was added onto in 1993. This is one of several other prominent buildings in Grand Forks that will soon celebrate that mark, including the Masonic Temple and Grand Forks County Court House (2013) and Central High School (2017). Interestingly enough, Grand Forks’ other high school Red River High School will celebrate fifty years in 2017.

Having commemorated the fiftieth anniversary of an important building in Grand Forks, hearty congratulations are extended to the City of Grand Forks for the centennial anniversary of the city hall.

The building is viewable through Google Street View on Google Maps and is below:

I would like to take a moment and focus on one specific collection, the Stuart McDonald Papers.  Stuart McDonald was a cartoonist who wrote for the Grand Forks Herald and the North Dakotan.  He attended the University of North Dakota from 1949-1951.  He became the vice-president of the McDonald Clothing Company in 1952, which was located at 311 Demers Ave.  Today we would recognize the building as Subway and Olivieri’s Hair Salon; if you look on the side of the building though, it still has the McDonalds logo on the side in the alley.

The collection is dedicated to the political cartoons he drew.  Some of my favorites are his cartoon “He Who Lives by the Sword…” which comments on the impact of the Vietnam on the federal budget and “It Went That-a-Way” which satirizes the cold North Dakota endures every winter.

McDonald’s work is very funny, if you understand the events of the time in which he wrote them.  I invite all who read this to browse through the digital collection on your computer, just imagine if you could access an entire library that way.

With the injury to his father, the family lost their main source of income. However, his mother was able to find work as a clerk and bookkeeper. As a result Chester Fritz was able to remain in school, and attended public school in Fargo from 1898 until 1905. It was during this time, in 1903, that the Fargo Carnegie Public Library opened and the young Fritz made daily visits, and consumed volumes of books. He was particularly enamored with Horatio Alger novels that gave the young man of no means hope for the future.

In 1905, when Chester Fritz was twelve years old, his mother apparently could no longer cope with the burdens of caring for a permanently handicapped husband and a young son. Anne Fritz disappeared in Februrary, 1905, and Chester Fritz never saw his mother again. As a result, he went to live in Lidgerwood, North Dakota, with his aunt and uncle, Katherine and Neil Macdonald. The change in his family status would change his life. The young Fritz excelled in Lidgerwood. He grew to become the high school football quarterback, and valedictorian of his graduating class.

Chester Fritz would go on to complete two years of higher education at the University of North Dakota, but he grew restless. Wanting to see more of the world he went west to Seattle, Washington. There he completed his baccalaureate degree in Commerce at the University of Washington. Shortly after he became employed by Fisher Flouring Mills, and it was while employed by that company that he began his journey to China. Selling flour in Hong Kong.

Want to hear Chester Fritz? Listen to a portion of his speech at our Omeka site from the original dedication ceremony in 1961:  Chester Fritz Library Dedication Speech Recording

To learn more about Chester Fritz, check out this video with Wilbur Stolt, Director of Libraries at the University of North Dakota:

In 1957 Chester Fritz first had the idea to donate his money to UND for a library, but he did not immediately send a letter to the University President or even the Head of Libraries on campus.  He instead contacted his aunt living in Illinois at the time, who would become an essential player in the final result of the donation money being given to UND, Kathrine Tiffany.  Tiffany’s role as the intermediary initially between Fritz and the head of libraries on campus, Jon R. Ashton, and then between Fritz and President Starcher, cannot be overstated in its importance.  Fritz’s initial letter to Tiffany outlined his ideas about the donation.

When Tiffany first contacted the university on Fritz’s behalf, she contacted only Jon Ashton. Fritz wanted an opinion on the condition of the current library from the head of libraries only, his unbridled opinion, Tiffany actually swore Ashton to secrecy so that only he was aware of the plot.  About one month after Tiffany contacted Ashton, she, on Fritz’s behalf, sent a letter to President Starcher regarding the possibility of a sizable donation from a former alum.  She did not tell Starcher who the donation would come from, but needless to say, Starcher was on the edge of seat for more information.

It would take a much closer inspection of President Starcher’s personal papers to gage his mood on being left out of the loop and strung along for those first months of communication between Fritz, Tiffany, and Ashton, but it would more than likely make for an interesting blog post, if such papers exist.

Chester Fritz sent Starcher the official donation letter from his villa in Rome on February 8, 1958, which finally named him as the donor and outlined the terms of his donation.  It is evident that Fritz had been planning the donation for a long while because only a little more than a week after he had mailed his donation letter to Starcher, most likely before Starcher even received the letter, he mailed a letter to Tiffany regarding a room in the Fritz that could be dedicated to some of his artifacts he had accumulated on his travels in Asia.

There were a few different ideas about where to place the library initially, here is one of the ideas that was not chosen, see if you can spot the library. Tiffany periodically checked in on the construction of the library to be able to send correspondence back to Fritz about the progress, an activity President Starcher regularly engaged in as well.  Finally on October 18, 1961, the library was dedicated with President Starcher’s speech.

For those of you who read this post, what would you like to see on the blog next?

As always make sure you’re following us on Twitter.

Also, our official website for the Fritz at 50.

**Media release from President Robert Kelley’s Office**

Dan Rylance, coauthor of the biography on the UND benefactor Chester Fritz, will discuss “Reflections on the Life and Legacies of Chester Fritz” Wednesday,  Oct. 19, at 7 p.m. in the Chester Fritz Library’s Reading Room.

The thrust of his address is to discuss the “Fritz challenge.”  According to Rylance, the term “Fritz challenge” comes from Fritz’s Oct. 13, 1961, library dedication speech, which said: “But now that we have this building, I am trusting that from time to time, alumni and other friends of the University will augment with private funds the regular legislative appropriations to the University for the growth of the library, so that this library will always be well-stocked with the type of books, magazines, and other materials needed for scholarly work in every department of the University.”

Rylance came to UND in 1964 as a graduate student in history and left in 1989 to become the editorial page editor of the Grand Forks Herald, a position he held until 1993. While at UND, he was coordinator of the Elwyn B. Robinson Department of Special Collections at the Chester Fritz Library and an associate professor of history.  Largely elected by UND’s students, Rylance served two terms in the North Dakota House of Representatives from 1975-1979. He co-authored Ever Westward to the Far East with Chester Fritz in 1982 and Quentin Burdick: The Gentle Warrior in 2007.

Dan Rylance’s presentation is part of the 50^th anniversary celebration of the Chester Fritz Library.

In Part 1 of “UND Libraries Through the Eyes of Geiger,” we reviewed the history of library facilities on UND’s campus from 1883-1908. Before 1908, the newly founded University committed few resources to the establishment of a library; mainly because it struggled to remain open and barely received sufficient funding from the state legislature.

However, by 1908 UND experienced a small amount of prosperity and began rapidly expanding. Not only were student and faculty populations increasing, but also more departments were created and more courses were offered. This growth demanded the construction of new buildings. With over 5,000 volumes in the reading room in Old Main, there was an obvious need for a separate library building. In 1906 a $30,000 dollar grant for the library was approved, and in 1908 the new library building was donated by Andrew Carnegie.

Carnegie (1835-1919) was one of the most successful businessman in the steel industry, and conveniently lived at a time when the steel industry was enormously prosperous due to railroad development. Later in life, Carnegie became a philanthropist, donating millions of dollars to build over 1,500 libraries across the U.S.! In North Dakota alone, Carnegie donated funds for eleven libraries.

The new UND Carnegie Library was a vast improvement compared to the old reading room, however Geiger explains that it “was to prove inadequate almost from the beginning. [President Webster] Merrifield was fully aware of this but was unable to persuade the legislature of 1907 to add $30,000 to the Carnegie gift.” (143) The building’s original blueprints had a third floor, however limited funds prevented such construction, and space was always limited. In addition, President Merrifield donated the land on which the Carnegie Library was built, and he funded the book stacks.

The red brick and stone trim style of the Carnegie Library, designed by the architectural firm Patton and Miller of Chicago, set a precedent for the appearance of buildings on campus that is still followed today. The Carnegie building housed UND’s book collections until 1928, when, over 60,000 volumes were moved to the Commons. Since 1928, the Carnegie building has been used for multiple purposes; today it houses the Office of Enrollment Services. This ends the second installment of “UND Libraries Through the Eyes of Geiger.” The next installment will discuss more about the Carnegie Library between 1908 and 1928, as well as introduce the Commons, the third building used as a library at UND.

To visit the Carnegie Building, set up a tour of UND’s Campus, or to speak with Enrollment Services call (701) 777-4463, visit und.enrollmentservices@email.und.edu, or stop by Carnegie Hall Room 100, 250 Centennial Drive.

Check out the Fritz at 50 celebration at http://library.und.edu/fritz-at-50/

Our Twitter feed http://twitter.com/#!/Fritzat50

And our Omeka page http://fritzat50.omeka.net/

Today marks the fiftieth anniversary of the dedication of the library. The University sent out many invitations to library staffs across the country inviting them to Grand Forks to share in our happiness and celebration of a new library facility. While most were unable to attend due to the distance to get to Grand Forks, they sent well wishes and some shared similar experiences of recent library constructions on their own campuses, which reflected the major changes coming to college and university campuses as they adjusted to different and expanding student populations both from veterans on the GI Bill to baby boomers entering adulthood.

Our library has changed much over the last fifty years. It has expanded in size, grown its collection, and incorporated new technologies to increase its accessibility to patrons, while changing how those patrons use it. It is the largest library in the state and is the heart of the UND campus. Chester Fritz’s donation of $1 million has certainly returned well in the thousands of students who have gained knowledge and their education through the library. Congratulations to the staff of the Chester Fritz Library on fifty wonderful years.

Check out the Fritz at 50 celebration at http://library.und.edu/fritz-at-50/

Follow us on Twitter

And our Omeka page http://fritzat50.omeka.net/