“Love and Honor”

As a journalism and media and communication double major, the majority of my classes have been in Williams Hall, where the Department of Media, Journalism and Film (MJF) is located. In just three semesters, I’ve had three separate classes in room 227.

Between my classes in Williams, I work in the lobby, forced to listen to the same couple of student interviews and short films playing on a loop on the television. Sometimes, I can be found in 139, an audio-recording studio where I’ve helped produce two podcasts for The Miami Student (TMS).

Or, if it's a particularly nice day, I'm outside in the courtyard: a small nook where stone benches sit surrounded by bush hedges. Roses grow in the center, and a tree in the corner hangs over blocking the sky above. It is small, quiet and secluded. It feels safe.

It’s perfect.

The courtyard has become my favorite place on campus; it's where I run to for comfort. If I only have an hour to eat dinner and don’t want to sit alone in a dining hall, I grab something to-go and sit in the courtyard. If I need somewhere quiet to focus on an assignment, I go to the courtyard. If I need someplace secure to regroup after a draining day, it's the courtyard I head to.

I’ve had a lot of difficult conversations with myself while sitting in the courtyard. Is journalism the right career for me? Do I really want to be in this relationship? Am I doing enough to solve my problems?

I feel hidden from the rest of the world when I’m surrounded by its greenery. I forget about deadlines, commitments and responsibilities. The leaves rustling from the wind block out the sounds of nearby traffic. I don’t even notice the world behind me if I turn ever so slightly away from the entrance.

And, consequently, I’m broken from the immersion when a door opens or someone enters the courtyard.

Like Mary Lennox in “The Secret Garden” by Frances Hodgson Burnett, I find myself drawn to this place, willing to waste hours inside my walled oasis. Like Mary, I’ve discovered my own secret garden.

However, I’ll soon be losing this safe haven, my garden.

At a faculty assembly on Feb. 12, 2020, the idea to move MJF to Bachelor Hall was presented. It proposed separating the campus into “corridors,” placing similar departments near each other to promote collaboration across disciplines. Bachelor Hall would become a “transdisciplinary humanities hub,” said former Provost Jason Osborne in an article by TMS. In addition to English, math and speech pathology and audiology, it would also host the honors program, the Western program, philosophy, language and MJF. After the move, Williams Hall would be torn down.

The decision was finalized, and renovations began at Bachelor Hall this year. The window panes have been torn out. Students walking by hear the noise of the deconstruction. The place is gutted and empty. The familiar, red fences shield the construction.

Classes will resume in the building by the fall of 2026, the start of my senior year. I’ll have to hike 20 minutes each day for my classes when Phillips Hall and Armstrong, the other two buildings I frequent, are much closer to where I’ll be living.

By then, I will no longer have reason to go back to Williams Hall, if it's still standing by then.

Not only will Miami lose my favorite spot on campus, but it will also lose the 65 years of history made in this building.

Williams Hall was built in 1959 for the communication department and studios for WMUB, the public FM radio station licensed to Miami University. The building was originally named Radio-TV but was changed in 1980 to honor Harry M. Williams, who was largely responsible for Miami’s early entry into radio and television.

Williams was the department chair of public speaking and was heavily involved in anything involving speech. He played a key role in the development of the first radio station at Miami in 1947. He assisted with the establishment of national legislation allowing low-power FM channels and ultra-high-frequency television channels for educational purposes.

Miami received a grant in 1984 to renovate Williams Hall, enlarging classrooms, adding more restrooms and making externally accessible entrances. The building was lowered to allow entry at all floor levels, reducing the parking lot. It was also enhanced to look more like a traditional Miami building.

Williams Hall was notably the home of WMUB for years. WMUB started as a student-run station and became an FM station in 1950. It was an opportunity for broadcasting and journalism students to get hands-on experience with reporting and on-air delivery.

It stayed this way for 59 years until Miami turned over operation to Cincinnati Public Radio in 2009. It's now a full-time satellite of WVXU in Cincinnati. Williams Hall’s transmission tower was torn down in 2020.

Without the tower, the building is easy to miss. Nestled between Bonham House and Phillips Hall, Williams Hall sits sunken, only accessible by a downhill walk. People don’t even know the building exists when I tell them where my classes are. It's not as visible as Bachelor Hall, something Fred Reeder Jr., associate clinical lecturer of journalism, noted.

Contrary to myself, Reeder is excited about moving MJF to Bachelor Hall, which is his favorite academic building on campus. As an English major and Miami alumnus, he spent most of his time there as a student, especially in the courtyard. He only had one class in Williams Hall, a communications course, and he didn’t frequent the building until he joined the MJF faculty in 2014.

Reeder believes the move will be a morale booster for the department, considering the prominent location of Bachelor Hall. He acknowledges its impact on faculty who feel a deep connection with Williams Hall and admits he is sad about the move, as he gets emotional about buildings and honoring legacies.

“‘Love and Honor’ is such a ubiquitous term for our school,” Reeder said. “If you're going to love something and honor something, then you treat it well. You want it around.”

Reeder believes the dilemma of tearing down historic buildings is a “systemic issue” within our country. He notes how this behavior isn’t often seen in other places, such as Europe, where heritage and building history are treasured.

“You would think Miami, with a history that goes back to 1809, would do everything possible to preserve the history of this campus,” Reeder said.

Williams Hall is not the only building of great significance that has been discarded. Before Yager Stadium, Miami Field was where students gathered to cheer on the football team. It sat at the corner of North Patterson Avenue and High Street, where Pearson Hall is now.

In 1983, it was moved down the hill and became Yager Stadium, taking the sights, sounds and liveliness of a football game away from campus. At its closing, it was the second oldest college football stadium after Franklin Field in Philadelphia.

Along with the proximity of the games went the footprints of some of the greatest coaches in football history. Many notable coaches stood on Miami’s sidelines, and removing the field removes where their legacies began.

“Once you take that away, it's gone, and you're never getting it back,” Reeder said.

Terence Moore, a 1978 Miami alumnus, frequently visited Miami Field. He even made a trip back to campus in honor of its closing.

“I was there at the last game at Miami Field in November 1983, and I was also at the first game at Yager Stadium in 1984,” Moore said.

Moore was not only the first African American writer at TMS but also the first African American sports editor. During his time there, he covered different sporting events and watched the legacy of many great players and coaches begin.

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Moore was born in South Bend, Indiana, and grew up by the University of Notre Dame. He said despite the similarities between Notre Dame and Miami, there is one distinct difference.

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“[Notre Dame] will never, ever, ever tear down an iconic anything,” Moore said. “They're going to keep them. They'll renovate it. They'll restore it.”

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Holy Cross Hall at Notre Dame, built in 1888, was first used as a seminary before becoming a residence hall in 1968. Over the next 22 years, it would be home to hundreds of students who formed community and long-lasting bonds.

The hall was demolished in 1990. However, instead of replacing it with another building, a gravestone was laid in its space.

“The men who lived in Holy Cross Hall and their families vigorously appreciate and thank the many contributions made by the brothers and priests of Holy Cross to the Notre Dame community,” reads the gravestone.

I’ve become quite fond of this idea. While researching this story, I’ve uncovered numerous buildings at Miami that I didn’t know were replaced. I’m now acutely aware of what is there and what used to be when I walk around campus. The thought of coming back after 30 years and seeing what's still standing feels eerie to think about.

Will my former residence halls still be here, providing a home for students after me? Will Phillips Hall, where my beloved Miami Dance Corps meets twice a week, be untouched, building onto the history of dancers at Miami who flock to it? Will the newsroom be somewhere else?

That’s up to the university.

Currently, three spots on campus are surrounded by construction fences: Bachelor Hall, Millett Hall and the Beta Bell Tower. The fences remind me of Whack-A-Mole: once one goes down, three more pop up. At times, it feels like Miami is a little too trigger-happy with its construction, ignoring the significance of these places.

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Another building Moore visited often was Withrow Court. Built in 1932, it was Miami’s main athletic facility until the construction of Millett Hall in 1968. It had three basketball/volleyball courts, eight racquetball courts, two classrooms, locker rooms and more. There was a small gymnasium for boxing, wrestling and fencing.

Additionally, it was an assembly hall where special events would be held, like a speech from Michelle Obama in 2012. It was also home to the University Archives, which merged with the Walter Havighurst Special Collections in 2016. It was named after John M. Withrow, an alumnus who returned to teach gynecology. He was a trustee for Miami for 46 years until he died in 1931.

Many well-known athletes, such as Darrell Hedric and Charlie Coles, were at Miami at the same time as Withrow Court.

Millett Hall was built in 1968 next to Yager Stadium, again moving a major athletic facility away from campus. Withrow Court was eventually repurposed and reopened as a residence hall in 2018 under the new name of Withrow Hall.

Again, another building of significance and history reduced to just a building. At least this time it was repurposed and not demolished to a pile of ash and brick.

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Like Miami Field and Withrow Court, Herron Gym is another sports-centered building that Miami tore down. It was a men’s gymnasium that was built in 1897. It was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1979, but that didn’t stop Miami from tearing it down and putting Roudebush Hall in its place.

“[Notre Dame is] not going to tear these things down, whereas Miami in the last 20 years ... have no problem with just taking a bulldozer to history,” Moore said.

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Looking at all this history, it's easy to quickly jump on the hate bandwagon. I’ll admit that I went into writing this ready to bash the university, to dive headfirst into my research and come out with an almost petition-like piece, pleading with Miami to keep this space I hold so dearly.

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However, after speaking with others, I’ve come to better understand the university’s perspective.

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Cody Powell, associate vice president of facilities planning and operations, said many things can contribute to a building’s renovation or deconstruction.

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“Space is expensive to maintain, so one of our roles here is to look at how the space is being used and make a determination: do we have enough space on campus to support the functions?” Powell asked.

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For Williams Hall, one reason is the finances of maintaining the building. Another is the university’s plan to place similar departments near each other to promote collaboration. 

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“This was our opportunity to be able to take care of humanities and create a space that we'd be proud of for the number of students that are taking classes in there,” Powell said.

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What is unique about Williams Hall — and MJF as a whole — is the types of spaces it requires. Video, audio, radio and editing studios are crucial to students’ learning in these majors. Bachelor Hall plans to accommodate that by repurposing the space where the former speech and hearing clinic was into a TV production studio.

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“We really feel like we're going to make a state-of-the-art facility for [MJF],” Powell said.

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Bachelor Hall is one of the most heavily utilized buildings on campus, therefore, Powell said the university wanted the building to be the best it could be.

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“To have a building that many students that we have touch not be showpieces is problematic,” Powell said.

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When MJF is not using the space, it can be used by other programs for presentations and lectures. This is one of the ways the university intends to promote collaboration and efficiency between departments.

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Another attempt at collaboration will be an open area in the center of the building, similar to the living rooms in the Farmer School of Business. When the university added these rooms to FSB, it saw that students would stay there the whole day, studying in between classes.

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“Buildings like Bachelor, Pearson ... it had no space like that, and our students would have to sit in the halls and the floor with other people walking over top of their legs, and it was just not the type of space that we think people could be successful in,” Powell said.

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The consequence of this idea? The removal of Bachelor Hall’s courtyard. I’ll admit, despite all the history, the hours spent and the memories made in Williams Hall, I wouldn’t be so upset about the move if one condition was met; the Bachelor Hall courtyard was kept. However, this will be gone too.

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Obviously, I’m not the only one who feels just a bit negatively about this move.

Rosemary Pennington, chair of MJF, is trying to be optimistic about the move but feels like the faculty will miss having their own spot on campus. Pennington has enjoyed bringing students to Williams and telling them it's their own building. She appreciates having features like the production studios in an area under their supervision.

“I really am going to mourn the loss of a space that we control ourselves and that allows us to sort of establish our identity in this space as well,” Pennington said.

Pennington thinks the move will be a transition for how MJF operates as a department and believes things will turn out okay.

“I think it'll be a good thing ultimately, but it's hard to know,” Pennington said. “We've been comfortable in this place for so long. It's hard to know what the future brings.”

“Love and honor” is the statement Miami University abides by.

At this point, I find it hard to believe. It's as if Miami intends to remove every little thing that makes it beautiful and unique, everything that makes me want to cherish this institution.

Take a walk around campus and tell me how many building signs you see that say it was built after 2000, as opposed to the ones built before. Will that be different in the next 20, maybe even 10 years?

How can Miami claim to praise history and tradition while getting rid of it in the process? How are we supposed to love and honor what is no longer there?

I don’t think we can.

Despite the terrible plumbing, the bees in the stairwell, the confusing hallways and the short film on the TV that forces me to hear “Rhiannon” by Fleetwood Mac at least five times a day, Williams Hall is my favorite place on campus. I’ve made countless memories within the walls: quick chats with professors in the common space, making jokes with my podcast partner Sarah Kennel during our recordings and, of course, moments of recollections in the courtyard outside.

And my senior year will be spent somewhere foreign to me.

I suppose nothing is meant to last forever, and all things must come to an end eventually. I won’t say I’m filled with excitement about the move, but I can’t say I’m blind to the benefits of it. I definitely don’t feel neutral; clearly, I feel passionate enough to write an almost 3,000-word story. But my heart still clunches when I see Williams Hall, knowing my time there is swiftly coming to a premature end.

Some things just have to go.

But, Miami University, please consider adding a new courtyard to Bachelor Hall.

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