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This memorial, honoring 44 members of the university community who died in that conflict, was dedicated April 16, 2005. The brick and stone terrace overlooks Potter Lake west of the campanile. Its centerpiece is a 7-foot copper sculpture, “Korean Cranes Rising,” by design professor Jon Havener. The four entwined cranes, ancient symbols of peace in the Korean culture, represent the four nations in the conflict: the United States, China, North Korea and South Korea. The memorial, designed by university architectural services, was funded by donations from alumni and foundations in Korea and the United States.
See also: Memorial Drive
Frazier (1906-76) was a 1929 design graduate who in the early 1940s established the first KU classes in sculpture; he left the university for a number of years but returned in 1956 as sculptor-in-residence and later professor of sculpture. The bronze doors at the north and south entrances of the Memorial Campanile were dedicated June 6, 1955. Each of the four doors, cast at foundries in Mexico City, is 9 feet tall and 3 feet 3 inches wide and contains three panels. The images were designed to be viewed from bottom right to top left.
On the south: The Doors of Memory
• The inscription is “Cedant Arma, Humanitati” (Let Arms Yield to Humanity)
• From bottom right to top left: Silence, Meditation, Sorrow, Aspiration, Courage and Achievement
• These doors were the gift of Mr. and Mrs. A.E. Stoddard of Omaha in memory of their son, Lt. Robert E. Stoddard, who was killed at Iwo Jima in 1945.
On the north: The Doors of Kansas
• The inscription is “Ad Astra Per Aspera” (The motto of the state of Kansas: “To the stars through difficulty”)
In 1978, Elden C. Tefft, a colleague of Frazier’s who collaborated on the original castings, replicated two panels to replace those damaged by vandals.
See also: Memorial Campanile
This W-shaped drive runs from West Campus Road east to Mississippi Street north of Snow, Strong and Bailey halls. It was designed to complement the Memorial Carillon and Campanile, honoring the 277 KU alumni, students, faculty and staff who died in World War II and the more than 7,000 who served.
As World War II ended, the sentiment grew for an enduring memorial. Chancellor Deane Malott, expressing the concerns of the alumni memorial committee and others, wrote: “The stadium was built as a World War I memorial. No one thinks, as he sits in it, about the sacrifices of several score of young men of this institution who lost their lives in that struggle. We have been determined this time that we would have a memorial, and not merely use that as an excuse to fill a need at the university.”
A campanile and carillon and the scenic drive wrapping them combined two of 17 suggestions the committee considered. Hare and Hare Landscape Architects of Kansas City designed the curving drive to follow the crest of Mount Oread above Marvin Grove and Potter Lake.
J.C. Nichols, a 1902 alumnus and developer of the Country Club Plaza in Kansas City, was a member of the committee, He noted that the drive presented “unlimited opportunity through the years for the placement of desirable memorials, locations for gifts of outdoor objects of art and other items of beautification.” Two such commemorative works have been added to the drive: the Vietnam War Memorial and the Korean War Memorial.
Installed in a circular landscaped area south of Gertrude Sellards Pearson and west of Corbin residence halls are several artifacts of KU’s earliest days.
These include the threshold and a stone windowsill from North College (right), the first structure on Mount Oread, which opened on the site in 1866 and was demolished in 1919; and a cast-iron fire basket (above), the 1927 gift of the Torch chapter of Mortar Board, a scholastic honorary society. The fire basket was used for several decades in freshman induction ceremonies; a version of the ritual survives in Tradition Night observances.See also: Mount Oread; Gertrude Sellards Pearson/Corbin Residence Hall Complex
The bronze medallion of this marker is 16.5 inches in diameter and bears the image of a conestoga wagon pulled by oxen and guided by a pioneer. The work of sculptors J.E. and L.G. Fraser, it is mounted on a limestone plinth about 4 feet tall and nearly 6 feet long. The whole is surrounded by a low ovoid stone wall; plantings and a flagpole complete the marker.
It was presented by the American Pioneer Trails Association to commemorate one of the sites on the ridge of Mount Oread that the California-Oregon Trail crossed in the 1840s and 1850s. The marker, dedicated April 17, 1954, was a gift of Howard and Margaret Brazier Driggs; he was president of the trail association, and she was a 1930 alumna. A plaque that was a gift of the Class of 1916 bears a quote from Across the Years on Mount Oread, a 1941 history by Robert Taft, a longtime KU chemistry professor.
See also: Lindley Hall
Chancellor Franklin Murphy and his two daughters “rediscovered” Pioneer Cemetery during a spring 1952 walk on undeveloped property west of Iowa Street and south of Irving Hill Road.
His interest piqued, he asked the KU Endowment Association to negotiate with the City of Lawrence to acquire the land, which the association did for $1 in May 1953.
Originally named Oread Cemetery, it had existed since the summer of 1854, shortly after the New England Emigrant Aid Society founded the town of Lawrence. Among the earliest burials were victims of the “Bleeding Kansas” border violence between abolitionists — Lawrence was a stronghold — and proslavery forces in the late 1850s.
The murder of Thomas K. Barber by proslavery partisans on Dec. 6, 1855, was memorialized by poet John Greenleaf Whittier, and an obelisk honoring Barber was erected. During the Civil War, a guerrilla raid led by William Clarke Quantrill on Aug. 21, 1863, killed about 200 Lawrence men and boys; about 70 were buried in Oread Cemetery. When the city opened Oak Hill Cemetery in 1865, most were reburied there. A large obelisk dedicated to unknown dead of the Civil War was dedicated in 1906.
Oread Cemetery fell into disuse; the city renamed it Pioneer Cemetery in 1928 and some repairs were made, but it again deteriorated. After the endowment association purchased the land, landscaping and repairs were done. In May 1968 burials resumed after noted chemist Elmer V. McCollum, an alumnus who discovered vitamins A and D and who had grown up near the cemetery, requested that his ashes be placed there.
Since then, more than 450 faculty and staff members have been inurned at Pioneer Cemetery. They include former chancellors Deane W. Malott, Raymond Nichols, and W. Clarke Wescoe; professors Takeru Higuchi, Fred Kurata, Raymond Moore, Charles Oldfather, Henry Shenk, and Edward Smissman; former dean of women Emily Taylor; and administrators Fred Ellsworth of the alumni association and Irvin Youngberg of the endowment association.
The memorial to Barber was restored and rededicated in spring 1997 by the Historic Mount Oread Fund and others. In 2004, the fund placed tablets engraved with Whittier’s poem at the monument.
See also: Ellsworth Residence Hall; Higuchi Hall; Kurata Thermodynamics Laboratories; McCollum Residence Hall; Malott Hall; Malott Gateway; Malott Plaza and Memorial Garden; Moore Hall; Murphy Hall; Nichols Hall; Oldfather Studios; Shenk Sports Complex; Smissman Research Laboratories; Wescoe Hall; Youngberg Hall
The Class of 1997 gave this reproduction of the University Seal depicting Moses kneeling before the burning bush. The image is surrounded by a Latin inscription that in English reads, “I will see this great vision in which the bush does not burn.”
The bronze medallion is 36 inches in diameter and mounted on a marble slab set on a triangular stone base about 4 feet tall. The whole is set in a large, raised rectangular planter topped by a stone bench.
The first KU chancellor, the Rev. R.W. Oliver, chose the seal in 1866. It was redesigned by Elden C. Tefft, a sculptor and professor of art, for the university’s centennial. The story of Moses’ vision is from the third chapter of Exodus, in the Old Testament of the Bible. Fire symbolizes knowledge in many stories and myths. Moses represents the humble attitude of the scholar who recognizes the unquenchable nature of the pursuit of truth and knowledge.
See also: Budig Hall/Hoch Auditoria
On May 25, 1986, dedication ceremonies were held for the Vietnam War Memorial, the first on-campus commemoration in the nation. It honors 57 students and alumni who died or were declared missing. The 65-foot, L-shaped wall of native Kansas limestone, at the west end of Memorial Drive, was created by Doran Abel, an architecture major; Stephan Grabow, professor of architecture and urban design; and Greg Wade, the university’s landscape architect. Student Senate appropriations and donations from students, alumni and veterans paid for the memorial.
See also: Memorial Drive
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