Student Center is symbol of education over research

Celebrities have spoken in its meeting rooms, an English professor has spray painted its walls and police have broken through its doors -- yet the Cesar Chavez Student Center still stands.

It has stood for 20 years and been the subject of criticism and marvel. The student center will celebrate its anniversary on Wednesday with a fashion show, Caribbean music and celebration cake for all.

But to really understand the building, one must learn the context in which it was conceived. One must know what the architect had in mind.

Humanities professor Arthur Chandler at SF State is one of the resident San Francisco historians on campus. Chandler is a member of the Holloway Historians, made up of current and ex-faculty members who celebrate the history of the university and make recommendations to planners about school grounds.

Chandler sees the building as a symbol.

"It's a symbol of SF State, a place where education counts more than research," Chandler said. "Education of its students is and ought to be paramount, and the student union correctly symbolizes that."

The symbolic nature of the building began before it was erected. In the mid-'60s students, sick of the old union building, which Chandler called "horribly inadequate," raised the money through student fees to hire a world renowned architect, Moishe Safdie.

Safdie designed a building in 1967 that was ultimately turned down by the state college trustees. This design was submitted around the same time as the infamous student strikes and demonstrations, which came about because of the lack of a black studies department. Some, including Chandler, saw the rejection of the students' building as punishment for the strikes.

"The trustees said, 'you have been bad girls and boys,' but that is radically oversimplifying it," said Chandler.

Indeed, many reasons were given as to why the trustees rejected the building, including the fear that it was unsound and the fear that it gave potential snipers too many places to hide.

Regardless, the original building plans were abandoned after a bitter fight that left both sides polarized, according to Chandler. Into that environment came architect Paffard Keatinge Clay.

"You really have to sympathize with this guy before you start dinging the building -- he came in a no-winner," said Chandler. "The students and the faculty felt that they'd been humiliated by the trustees."

Clay, who studied under famous architect Frank Lloyd Wright, gave the students the opportunity to have input into what was to be "their" building. In an October, 1975 interview with the Phoenix, the SF State paper of the time, Clay talked about how the students got involved.

"I spoke with a tremendous number of students before beginning the design. I participated in about 20 seminars which were arranged to facilitate student input, and there were open forums in the gallery lounge to which all students were invited," Clay said.

Chandler saw the meetings as helpful.

"What he did was to survey the students at the time saying, 'What do you want?' Well, 'we want a bank,' 'we want a restaurant,' 'we want a cafe' -- and on the basis of that survey among students, the building was built the way it is right now," he said.

But once it was finished, many students thought the building was ugly. The month it was opened, September, 1975, the Phoenix sent a reporter out to get a general reaction.

Among the reactions received were that the building was too drafty, too noisy, too gaudy and lacked color.

Clay attributed the reaction to the changing nature of students. The administration and Clay took the students' input in the early '70s, and the building opened in 1975.

"One of the problems with seeking student input is that students change so drastically over the years," Clay said.

Chandler agreed, but offered a somewhat more complex view of the students' initial reaction.

"People changed their minds. Students of the 1970s are not the students of the 1980s and 1990s," said Chandler. "But an architect is partly responsible for that, too. An architect ought to have some sense of vision of the particular moment. On the other hand you can't expect an architect to be a profit either."

Among other things that might have dated the building in some students' minds was the first purpose of the towers, expressed by Clay in his interview with the Phoenix.

"The purpose was to design one tower where people could go to meditate or practice yoga, to be quiet and seek their own level of consciousness," reflected Clay. "This would be done by one person individually or by a couple -- like two people in love."

Perception of Clay's work aside, the building now needed a name. When none was forthcoming from the administration, the Phoenix held a contest to christen the new student center.

The Phoenix only received approximately 100 entries in March, 1975, and the name that stuck was "Fenneman Hall," edited down from "The George Fenneman Memorial Student Union."

George Fenneman attended SF State in the 1940s and went on to be Groucho Marx' sidekick in the television series "You Bet Your Life." Because of the absurdity of the name, the editorial board of the Phoenix took it and ran.

When they got in touch with Fenneman the following week his first words, when told of the "honor," were, "Oh shit, that's the weirdest thing I ever heard." Fenneman went on to say, "I don't know if it's a left-handed compliment or an honor. Really, it's a feeling of disbelief, but I find it kind of campy."

In November, 1975, the Phoenix brought Fenneman to campus, set up a make-shift dedication, and had him cut a ribbon for a crowd of about 50 people. Needless to say, the name didn't stick, and the student union would be without a name until the Cesar Chavez dedication.

Throughout the late '70s, many celebrities came to the building to speak, including Ralph Nader, Jane Fonda, Robert Kennedy Jr. and ex-black panther Bobby Seele. But as the '70s ended and the '80s began, student activism decreased and activity at the center was confined to the mundane student experience.

The fiery days of demonstrations and student strikes were over and a new atmosphere took hold of the campus.

"It has to do with the spirit of the times," said Chandler. "This place, after it blew up in the '60s, it just calmed down, and students and faculty both came to campus, did their job and went home."

This calm would not last.

[ back to Golden Gater Online September 12, 1995 ]

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