Graves Center

Graves Center

Education; Lee County, AL; Auburn University; New Deal; Graves, Bibb; Graves Center; Greek Revival; Agricultural Extension Service; Auburn University Special Collections and Archives; Montgomery, AL; Alabama Polytechnic Institute; Auburn, AL

Alabama Polytechnic Institute built the Graves Center – actually a complex of thirty cottages, an amphitheatre, a large dining hall, and a brass bust of New Deal era governor Bibb Graves – piecemeal throughout the 1930s. The complex of 30 Greek Revival style white cottages were originally intended by the Agricultural Extension Service to accommodate agriculturalists in town for conventions, but served a variety of functions, including housing Auburn’s football team. The dining hall served as the university cafeteria and also served as a venue for dances, costume parties, and commencement exercises. The university relocated the brass bust of Bibb Graves to the Auburn University Special Collections and Archives on the bottom floor of Ralph Brown Draughon Library. Today, two remnants of the Graves Center remain on campus. The first is the amphitheatre, which was originally constructed from granite setts that once paved Commerce Street in downtown Montgomery. Graves Amphitheatre is located at the corner of Duncan Drive and Graves Drive on Auburn University’s campus. One of the Greek Revival cottages still stands approximately four hundred feet west of the intersection of Duncan Drive and West Samford Avenue.

Taylor McGaughy

Image Source:http://s83.photobucket.com/user/randy4au/media/Auburn/au_webfinds/bibb_graves_amphitheatre.jpg.html

Text Source: Ralph Draughon, Jr., Delos Hughes, and Ann Pearson, Lost Auburn: A Village Remembered in Period Photographs (Montgomery: NewSouth Books, 2012), 31-32.

Alabama Cultural Resource Survey

2014-11-28

Taylor McGaughy

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Still Image and Text