 Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge - Baton Rouge, LA
N 30° 24.867 W 091° 10.683
15R E 675002 N 3366120
District is located in Baton Rouge, mainly between Highland Rd. and Nicholson Dr. Coordinates taken from in front of Memorial Tower, on campus. District consists of 46 buildings dating from the 1920's through the 1930's.
Waymark Code: WM5FQC
Location: Louisiana, United States
Date Posted: 01/01/2009
Views: 10
Where to start...loads of history, from local to international. The 46 contributing buildings are spread out over campus, but all in walking distance. Being a major university, there is ALOT of history avalible over the internet. I'll keep it very brief with a small excerp from original Register application located here."The nominated campus is actually the fourth location the Louisiana State University has
occupied. The Louisiana State Seminary of Learning and Military Academy opened in Pineville in
1860. In 1869 fire destroyed the building and classes moved to the State School for the Deaf and
Dumb in Baton Rouge. Regrettably, this mid-nineteenth century Gothic Revival building no longer
exists.
In 1886 the institution again moved, this time to the Pentagon Barracks, an 1819 military
installation consisting of four linear galleried buildings disposed around a pentagon shaped court.
The college also occupied other nearby buildings, adding to its campus in a piecemeal fashion
during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. But the flourishing university outgrew its
quarters and could no longer expand because the campus was hemmed in by the city of Baton
Rouge on the south and east, the University Lake on the north, and the Mississippi River on the
west.
In 1918, largely through the efforts of President Thomas Boyd, the University purchased
Gartness Plantation south of downtown Baton Rouge to be the site of a new and expanded campus.
The following year successful gubernatorial candidate John M. Parker made the development of the
"Greater University" a salient feature of his campaign. Ground-breaking ceremonies took place in
1922 and the new campus was formally dedicated on April 30, 1926. Classes were actually held on
the new site beginning in the fall semester of 1925.
The gala dedication ceremony implied a sense of finale which belied the architectural
development of the campus. True, most of the principal buildings were in place, but what we regard
as the historic campus grew in stages from the early 1920s through the late 1930s. On January 1,1939 the university issued a map showing all existing campus buildings plus those currently under
construction."Official LSU website
Street address: Highland Rd. Baton Rouge, LA USA 70803
 County / Borough / Parish: East Baton Rouge
 Year listed: 1988
 Historic (Areas of) Significance: Architecture/Engineering (Architectural Style: Classical Revival, Late 19th And 20th Century Revivals, Other)
 Periods of significance: 1900-1924, 1925-1949
 Historic function: Education. Sub - College
 Current function: Education. Sub - College
 Season start / Season finish: From: 01/01/2009 To: 12/31/2009
 Hours of operation: From: 9:00 AM To: 5:00 PM
 Primary Web Site: [Web Link]
 Secondary Website 1: [Web Link]
 Privately owned?: Not Listed
 Secondary Website 2: Not listed
 National Historic Landmark Link: Not listed

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