UGA renovating oldest permanent building

<p>Old College once housed the entire University of Georgia within its walls.</p><p>Now the oldest permanent building on campus is undergoing $1.9 million renovations set to be finished in time for the building's 200th birthday.</p><p>Old College was built in 1806 and held the university's dormitory, library, dining hall and classrooms.</p><p>"Old College is the strongest link with the past," said Nash Boney, an emeritus history professor who has written books and articles about UGA history.</p><p>Among other changes, workers will install central heating and air conditioning, which means the end of window units that dot the historic building's exterior.</p><p>Workers also will add an elevator, replace outdated plumbing and electrical systems and raise the building's ceilings to their historic heights, said project manager Scott Messer.</p><p>The building, known in the 1800s as Franklin College, was closed down by the middle of the Civil War, Boney said, then reopened as a dorm until the turn of the 20th century.</p><p>The building was modeled after Yale University's Connecticut Hall _ the oldest remaining building on the Yale campus, completed in 1753.</p><p>"The people who founded the university were Yankees, out of the Connecticut area," Boney said. "There was a strong northern influence."</p><p>By about 1900, Old College was in such bad shape that the university couldn't secure fire insurance for it and students were allowed to live there free if they were willing to chance it, Boney said.</p><p>Then-chancellor Walter B. Hill wanted to tear the building down, but supporters raised $10,000 to save Old College, Boney said _ a preservation effort that was rare for that time period.</p><p>"It would have been an awful loss," said Tom Dyer, director of UGA's Institute of Higher Education and author of a bicentennial history of the university.</p><p>The building got a new layer of brick and returned to dorm status until World War II, when the U.S. Navy used UGA for a training program. The Navy renovated the interior of Old College for use as "Yorktown Barracks."</p><p>In recent years, the building has housed the office of the president and other administrative offices.</p><p>Once the renovations are complete, Franklin College will return to its original home, vacating the current cramped space in New College.</p><p>Though the work will focus mainly on electrical and mechanical systems, crews also will add a classroom _ a reminder of the building's history.</p><p>___</p><p>HASH(0x1cdc280)</p>

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