Fenwick Library

Here follows an excerpt from the George Mason University library website:

George Mason University: A History
Preparing for Rapid Growth

By the 1967-68, academic year enrollment was up to 1,128, four times as many students as the college drew in its first year at Fairfax, only 3 years ago. Crowding was relieved in the fall of 1967 with the new free-standing Library and Lecture Hall buildings. Spaces that once housed these two functions were opened up for new classroom space. The Library measured 31,000 sq ft, and had a capacity of 31,000 volumes and reading facilities for 500 users. It was built at a cost of $1.2 million, which included a $373,333.00 federal grant. Students helped move most of the 20,000 books over from the East Building when the library opened. It was dedicated in December 1967 and named for state senator from Arlington, Charles Rogers Fenwick.

Mason's First Building Boom:
Filling out the First Forty Acres during the 1970s

In late 1970 the 568-acre Fairfax Campus of George Mason College comprised six buildings and a parking lot. The tiny North, South, East, and West Buildings opened in September 1964 and hosted classrooms, labs, administrative and faculty offices, and the dining hall. Fenwick Library and the Lecture Hall were completed in the fall of 1967. A seventh building, the Arts and Sciences Building, which was later named Thompson Hall, was still under construction and would not open until September 1971. The steady increase in enrollment, coupled with Mason’s ambitious expansion program, necessitated additional buildings.

In 1970, a new wave of building began at Mason. Key buildings would begin to fill the first forty cleared acres of the original 147 given by the Town of Fairfax in 1959. Aerial photography of the campus from that era showed some kind of construction, no matter what year the photo was taken. At one point in 1974, three major construction projects within yards of each other (the Fenwick Library Tower, Robinson A, and the Student Union) were in progress simultaneously. Construction trailers and vehicles, steel framing, and large piles of dirt were an everyday part of the campus landscape for much of the 1970s.

By 1970, library administrators concluded that Fenwick Library was not large enough to be able to handle the projected enrollment and collections growth that was to take place over the next several years. Library Director Patrick Larkin and Chancellor Thompson drew up plans for a massive five-story tower, which would be connected to the south façade of the library. The tower would provide much-needed additional space for research, administrative offices, library collections, and expanded library services. The Fenwick Library Tower would eventually open in November 1974 after library administrators closed down the library for several days to facilitate the movement of books and other materials into the new space.


<•>•<•>•<•>•<•>•<•>•<•>•<•>•<•>
<•>•<•>•<•>•<•>•<•>•<•>•<•>•<•>

Here follows an excerpt from "Vault217" which is George Mason University Libraries' Special Collections Research Center blog:

What a Difference Fifty Years Makes: The Original Fenwick Library Building Today
July 6, 2017

What was once considered old has become new again!

During the fall of 1967, George Mason College of the University of Virginia opened its fifth building on the Fairfax Campus. The original four – North (now Finley), South (now Krug), East and West – went into service in August of 1964. A significant part of West Building served as the college library until the completion of the 14,000 square-foot two-story library in 1967. During the building’s dedication in December, it was named for a local member of the state legislature, Senator Charles Rogers Fenwick. Fenwick, a speaker at the event, was unaware of the naming plan until it was announced at the ceremony itself. He was admittedly surprised and humbled by the gesture.

As Mason became an independent university, and enrollment tripled over the next sixteen years, Fenwick would undergo two major additions. A tower was added to the southwest part of the building in 1974, and an identical one on the southeast side in 1983. By the end of the 1980s, administrators agreed that the university’s needs were growing faster than the library. Plans for more additions to the library were drawn up but shelved to make budget room for the upcoming University Learning Center (known today as the Johnson Center).

By the early 2000s library administration and staff were planning again for a new addition to Fenwick that would add more space for study, programming, and housing of staff and library resources. By 2013 ground was broken, and construction was underway. The new Fenwick Library would take over two years to construct and add over 2,000 seats for study, a 24-hour café and study space, a state-of-the-art Special Collections Research Center with dedicated space for exhibitions, and dedicated areas that can be used for special library events. The 150,000-square foot addition was completed in January 2016 and complies with LEED silver standards.

So, what happened to the original library space?

It has been transformed into the MIX@Fenwick. The MIX network (Mason Innovation Exchange) consists of two on-campus entrepreneurship- focused collaboration and maker spaces. The MIX@Fenwick is a student-centered collaboration and event space that will promote and encourage entrepreneurship at Mason. It opened its doors to the Mason community in June 2017.

MIX@Fenwick provides students, faculty, and staff with spaces and tools for co-working, collaboration, and experiential learning. Multi-disciplinary groups can come together to meet, develop ideas, research problems, craft solutions, and start companies. The MIX@Fenwick is intended to be a place to promote interactions among students, faculty, staff, alumni, investors, and business advisors.

The Mason Innovation Exchange network seeks to empower students with the tools to solve problems and pursue entrepreneurial opportunities; provide a place to meet, socialize, and collaborate; create a network of entrepreneurial-minded individuals; and create a start-up culture at Mason.

For fifty years Fenwick Library has been an anchor building on the Fairfax Campus, bringing together students, faculty, and staff. Now that the original has been replaced, it is gratifying to see the former space repurposed and used once again as place for collaboration.


<•>•<•>•<•>•<•>•<•>•<•>•<•>•<•>
<•>•<•>•<•>•<•>•<•>•<•>•<•>•<•>

Here follows an excerpt from the George Mason University library website:

George Mason University: A History
Expanding Patriot Pride: Remaking Fenwick Library

On December 15, 1967, at three o’clock in the afternoon, 200 faculty members, administrators and students of George Mason College gathered along with the Lieutenant Governor of Virginia to formally dedicate the College’s newly opened library. Since that mid-December day, Fenwick Library has become a cornerstone of student life at Mason. It is arguably one of the more popular places for students to study, relax, or simply meet with friends on campus. In 2013, construction began on Fenwick Library’s largest expansion in thirty years. The fifth building built on the Fairfax campus, Fenwick has a long history that begins even before ground was broken on Mason’s Fairfax Campus.

The plans to build the original section of Fenwick Library, often referred to today as “Wing A”, date back to 1960. A May 1960 planning document for the Fairfax Campus of George Mason College allocates 10,528 sq. feet to a library as part of a “Phase I” building program. An additional 8,332 sq. feet was to be allocated in “Phase II” of construction. A memo dated October 26, 1960, addressed to John Norville Gibson Finley, Director of George Mason College, then located at Bailey’s Crossroads, described in detail the proposed layout for the college’s future permanent library. As further plans were made for the Fairfax Campus, it was decided that a permanent library would not open in 1964 with the first four academic buildings. The library was to be temporarily housed on the second floor of “Building D,” today known as the East Building.

A Library Building Committee, which included George Mason College Director Robert Reid, College Librarian Pat Larkin, and long-time George Mason College supporter C. Harrison Mann, Jr., a member of the Virginia House of Delegates, met in 1964 to make more definitive plans for a permanent library. An undated library proposal, which was likely written sometime in the early 1960s, stresses the concept of the library as a “study hall” facility and urges that the building be large enough to accommodate fifty percent of the student body at any one time. In November 1964 more detailed plans called for the library to include a smoking lounge for students, a staff room, and a room with a cot and private bathroom for staff or students who became “indisposed.”

The plan also anticipated that the library would be able to hold 500 readers after Phase I construction was complete, and 1,250 readers after Phase II construction was complete. The college’s 1966 Master Plan depicted the college library as the center of new construction on campus. It detailed how the library would look after both Phase I and II were completed, with the proposed Phase II addition bearing a strong resemblance to what would become the second library tower (later known as Fenwick Library’s Phase III expansion) in 1983. A second “site plan” from 1966 featured a reflecting pool in front of the library.

The library opened in the fall of 1967 with storage space for 50,000 volumes, the requirement for all two-year institutions. Construction of the Library took about sixteen months to complete, and by late October 1967 it was ready to be occupied. On move-in day library staff, along with dozens of volunteers from the student body, carted some twenty thousand volumes from the East Building to the new library to be shelved. In preparation for George Mason College becoming a larger institution, the administration immediately began the push to increase the storage capacity to 100,000 volumes, the new minimum required for all four-year institutions.

On December 15, 1967 the college held the formal dedication of the new library. The hour-long ceremony included remarks by George Mason College Chancellor, Lorin A. Thompson, Architect William F. Vosbeck, University of Virginia President, Edgar F. Shannon, Jr., and Virginia Lieutenant Governor, Fred G. Pollard. A tour of the library was given afterwards. During President Shannon’s remarks he announced that the library would be named Fenwick Library after Virginia State Senator Charles Rogers Fenwick of Arlington, a long time backer of George Mason College. Fenwick had helped draw up and pass General Assembly Resolution #5 which created the college. As Rector of the Board of Visitors of the University of Virginia for a number of years, he steadfastly supported the growth of the college and participated in many of its official events. In 1963 Fenwick had turned the first shovelful of earth at the groundbreaking ceremony for the Fairfax Campus. The announcement came as a surprise to many of the attendees, most notably Senator Fenwick himself who called it “the greatest honor” he had ever received.

Fenwick Library had undergone two major renovations in its first sixteen years. In 1970, George Mason College administrators realized that the original Fenwick Library structure (which did not include the proposed “Phase II addition”) was not large enough for the rapidly increasing student population. In November 1974, George Mason University opened a five-story tower connected to Fenwick Library as part of a new “Phase II” expansion. A second tower opened in 1983 as part of Fenwick Library’s “Phase III” construction.

In the mid and late 1980s, administrators at George Mason University Libraries began drawing up plans for additional library towers as part of a “Phase IV” and eventually “Phase V” expansion project. This building program was eventually abandoned when the University Libraries instead decided to propose what would become the George W. Johnson Learning Center, which opened as the University Learning Center in 1995. An innovation was the combining of state funding for two separate projects--a library and a Student Union--into a single, larger project.

As student population growth continued into the 21st Century, library administrators returned to the Fenwick Library expansion concept. The University’s 2007 Master Plan included an addition to the existing Fenwick Library buildings. The new library opened in 2016.

Regarding Fenwick Library’s expansion, University Librarian John Zenelis noted that “Over the decades, Fenwick’s appearance and size has changed, but its function of serving the university community as Mason’s main research library has remained constant.” The main library on George Mason University’s Fairfax Campus has come a long way from its early life as part of the second floor of the East Building. The expansion project leaves Fenwick Library poised to become one of the largest buildings on the Fairfax Campus. As Mason’s largest library continues to grow and modernize, it will certainly continue to play an essential role in lives of all Mason students.