University of North Carolina Chapel Hill - Yackety Yack Yearbook (Chapel Hill, NC)

Page 11 text:

Much of a University ' s heritage and tradition can be traced in the history of one building and outgrowths from it. What is today known as Playmaker ' s Theatre is one such building. Built in 1851 Playmaker ' s was the fifth structure built at U.N.C. and was known originally as Smith Building. In those early years it held the only bath facilities on the campus; thinly clad males journeying from their dorm rooms in Old East and Old West were warned of the approach of females by the cry, Angel on the campus! During the War Between the States, when Union troops occupied Chapel Hill, they quar- tered their horses in Smith Building, which at that time held the University Library. The library remained there until 1929, when it was moved to the first unit of what is now Louis R. Wilson Library. Since 1929, Smith has housed the Playmaker ' s drama group and has served as its theatre; it has even adopted the name of these new tenants as its own. From this one build- ing a wealth of Carolina tradition can be learned, and it is by no means unique in this respect.

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Its cornerstone laid in 1793 and formally opened on January 15, 1795, Old East is the oldest building on a state-supported campus in the United States. It is ironic, of course, that the seeds of discord which nearly wrecked the University are pres- ent in that proud boast. For in its subservience to tne state, the University of North Carolina is seemingly controlled by those very forces of ignorance which it seeks to eliminate. Yet, the very presence of Old East is testimony to the ability of an insti- tution to transcend its opponents and rise triumphant; that one edifice has been in existence for over 170 years, while those in the nineteenth century who feared atheistic, sinful science, and in the twentieth who feared atheistic Communism, have passed away. The spirit of Carolina has grown and will grow; it is evi- denced in its inception in Old East and in its growth to the present in Morrison. But there is still something else that re- mains and will remain even when these buildings have fallen — that is the student, the universal student, the University stu- dent. Whether he be a Carolina Gentleman or scholar, whether a he or a she, the student will always be here. And is it not in the student, in the development of the human mind, that excel- lence in the University and in the world is achieved? And in- deed, regardless of the blindness prevalent in the states, it is only through the student that freedom can prevail.