THE EVOLVING CAMPUS
POINT GREY 1950's

The University campus changed relatively little through the 1920's and 1930's. New construction was to a large part funded by students themselves - in particular a gymnasium, a stadium, and Brock Hall (student union building). The situation changed after the Second World War. A post-war construction boom was fuelled by increased federal government funding for defence-related and other research, and by the need to house returning veterans, whose number tripled enrolment through the late 1940's. Between 1947 and 1951 more than twenty new buildings were completed, including the Physics, Biological Sciences, and Engineering Buildings, the Wesbrook Building for the new Faculty of Medicine, and War Memorial Gymnasium. In addition, fifteen abandoned Army and Air Force camps were dismantled and their huts hauled to campus on tractor-trailers and erected to serve as classrooms, laboratories, and residences. The 1950's were largely a period of consolidation, with the Buchanan (Arts) Building being the major development.


Point Grey campus, looking northeast (1958) - click on a building to see detail or use the list:
Biological Sciences - Wesbrook Building - War Memorial Gymnasium - Stadium - Physics - Buchanan Building - Old Gymnasium - Brock Hall - Armoury - Engineering - Army Huts
[Biological Sciences building] [Wesbrook building] [War Memorial Gymnasium] [Stadium] [Physics building] [Buchanan building] [Old Gymnasium] [Brock Hall] [Armoury] [Engineering building] [Army huts] [Point Grey campus, 1958 (image map)]
UBC Archives Photo #1.1/3196

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