Columbia University sundial
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The Class of 1885 Memorial Sundial is a landmark at
Columbia University Columbia University (also known as Columbia, and officially as Columbia University in the City of New York) is a private research university in New York City. Established in 1754 as King's College on the grounds of Trinity Church in Manhatt ...
, located at the center of the College Walk at the other end of Butler Plaza from
Butler Library Butler Library is located on the Morningside Heights campus of Columbia University at 535 West 114th Street, in Manhattan, New York City. It is the university's largest single library with over 2 million volumes, as well as one of the largest bui ...
. Designed by astronomy professor Harold Jacoby in conjunction with
McKim, Mead & White McKim, Mead & White was an American architectural firm that came to define architectural practice, urbanism, and the ideals of the American Renaissance in fin de siècle New York. The firm's founding partners Charles Follen McKim (1847–1909), Wil ...
, it was completed in 1914. The granite sphere that once sat on top of it, at some point considered the largest stone sphere in the world, was removed in 1946 after it began to crack; efforts have been made toward its recovery since it was rediscovered in Michigan in 2001. The sundial's bare platform now serves as a popular meeting area for students, as well as a center for campus politics.


History


Design and construction

The
sundial A sundial is a horological device that tells the time of day (referred to as civil time in modern usage) when direct sunlight shines by the apparent position of the Sun in the sky. In the narrowest sense of the word, it consists of a flat ...
was originally topped with a dark-green granite sphere, dubbed the "Sunball", which served as its
gnomon A gnomon (; ) is the part of a sundial that casts a shadow. The term is used for a variety of purposes in mathematics and other fields. History A painted stick dating from 2300 BC that was excavated at the astronomical site of Taosi is the ol ...
. The stone was sourced from
Mount Ascutney Mount Ascutney is a mountain in the U.S. state of Vermont. At , it is the second-highest peak in Windsor County, Vermont, Windsor County. (The highest peak in the county is Gillespie Peak in the Joseph Battell Wilderness.) Mount Ascutney is a mon ...
in
Vermont Vermont () is a state in the northeast New England region of the United States. Vermont is bordered by the states of Massachusetts to the south, New Hampshire to the east, and New York to the west, and the Canadian province of Quebec to ...
, from a quarry that was reportedly "well-loved by a group from the class of 1885". The sphere was the third of its kind made, after the first two were rejected for having cracks. Originally planned by
McKim, Mead & White McKim, Mead & White was an American architectural firm that came to define architectural practice, urbanism, and the ideals of the American Renaissance in fin de siècle New York. The firm's founding partners Charles Follen McKim (1847–1909), Wil ...
to be purely ornamental, astronomy professor Harold Jacoby suggested that it be presented on behalf of the class of 1885 as a sundial, as a gift that would both be aesthetically pleasing as well as "possess a distinct educational value". It was intended to be placed in the center of 116th Street, which at that point had not yet been sectioned off by the university, to serve as a "haven of rest" for students walking across campus; after objections from the New York City government against placing a tall sphere in the middle of a busy street, it was moved to the side of the road in front of Butler Plaza, which was then the college's football field.A plaster model of the sundial was presented to the university by the class of 1885 in June 1910 to mark its 25th anniversary, and construction on the actual monument began shortly thereafter. It was completed and presented a second time on May 26, 1914. In total, the installation cost around $10,000. A contemporary university publication claimed that the Sunball was the largest stone sphere on Earth.


Removal and rediscovery

A crack in the Sunball was discovered in 1944, which continued to grow until 1946, when the university found it too unsafe to remain. The university attempted to hold the sphere together, first by inserting a bronze rod into it and then with an "unsightly iron band", before erecting a chicken-wire fence around the sundial and removing it altogether in December 1946. At the time, it was reported to have been broken into pieces and sent to a stone yard in
the Bronx The Bronx () is a borough of New York City, coextensive with Bronx County, in the state of New York. It is south of Westchester County; north and east of the New York City borough of Manhattan, across the Harlem River; and north of the New Y ...
. However, the Sunball was rediscovered intact in a field near
Ann Arbor, Michigan Ann Arbor is a city in the U.S. state of Michigan and the county seat of Washtenaw County, Michigan, Washtenaw County. The 2020 United States census, 2020 census recorded its population to be 123,851. It is the principal city of the Ann Arbor ...
in 2001; the owner of the field had inherited it from an unknown Columbia affiliate. Efforts have been made by students to recover the Sunball, though concerns around costs as well as the wish to preserve the bare pedestal's role as a "free speech corner" on campus have prevented its return. The sundial has been noted as a meeting area for students, as well as a site of frequent protests. Since the removal of the Sunball, its pedestal has become a popular location for protesting students to make speeches—so popular that, during the turbulent 1960s, the university banned for a period the use of microphones and amplifiers to address students at sundial rallies. Notably, the
Columbia University protests of 1968 In 1968, a series of protests at Columbia University in New York City were one among the various student demonstrations that occurred around the globe in that year. The Columbia protests erupted over the spring of that year after students disco ...
began at the sundial, where
Mark Rudd Mark William Rudd (born June 2, 1947) is an American political organizer, mathematics instructor, anti-war activist and counterculture icon who got involved with the Weather Underground in the 1960s. Rudd became a member of the Columbia Unive ...
addressed several hundred students at a rally on April 23, 1968, before they marched up to
Low Memorial Library The Low Memorial Library (nicknamed Low) is a building at the center of Columbia University's Morningside Heights campus in Manhattan, New York City, United States. The building, located near 116th Street between Broadway and Amsterdam Aven ...
and occupied Hamilton Hall. In the early 1970s, the sundial was the site of frequent political effigy-burnings; victims included university presidents Andrew W. Cordier (1970) and
William J. McGill William James McGill (27 February 1922 – 19 October 1997) was an American psychologist, author, and academic administrator. He was the 16th president of Columbia University and the 3rd chancellor of the University of California San Diego. Bio ...
(1973),
Richard Nixon Richard Milhous Nixon (January 9, 1913April 22, 1994) was the 37th president of the United States, serving from 1969 to 1974. A member of the Republican Party, he previously served as a representative and senator from California and was ...
(1972, 1974), and South Vietnamese President
Nguyễn Văn Thiệu Nguyễn Văn Thiệu (; 5 April 1923 – 29 September 2001) was a South Vietnamese military officer and politician who was the president of South Vietnam from 1967 to 1975. He was a general in the Republic of Vietnam Military Forces, Republic o ...
(1975). In addition to more recent protests, the sundial has also been used for candlelight vigils,
Shakespeare plays Shakespeare's plays are a canon of approximately 39 dramatic works written by English poet, playwright, and actor William Shakespeare. The exact number of plays—as well as their classifications as tragedy, history, comedy, or otherwise—is a ...
, and several mock sacrifices of virgins.


Design

The pedestal of the sundial is inscribed with the Latin phrase ''Horam Expecta Veniet'' ("wait for the hour and it will come"). The twelve brass inserts on the base, designed by alumnus
William Ordway Partridge William Ordway Partridge (April 11, 1861 – May 22, 1930) was an American sculptor, teacher and author. Among his best-known works are the Shakespeare Monument in Chicago, the equestrian statue of General Grant in Brooklyn, the ''Pietà'' at S ...
, represent the cycle of the day, and are named, respectively: "Torches of the Morning", "Increase of the Dawn", "Chanticleer", "Sun Rise", "Love Awakening", "Boiling the Pot", "Love Crowning the Hours", "Love at Play", "Love Tempers the Night Wind", "The Evening Star", "Love Piping to the Moon", and "Voices of the Night". The sundial was designed by Jacoby to show
Eastern Standard Time The Eastern Time Zone (ET) is a time zone encompassing part or all of 23 states in the eastern part of the United States, parts of eastern Canada, the state of Quintana Roo in Mexico, Panama, Colombia, mainland Ecuador, Peru, and a small port ...
(as opposed to
local solar time Solar time is a calculation of the passage of time based on the position of the Sun in the sky. The fundamental unit of solar time is the day, based on the synodic rotation period. Two types of solar time are apparent solar time (sundial tim ...
, as most sundials did). Given the variations between standard and solar time, it was designed to indicate the time only once a day at noon, by noting either edge of the shadow cast by the gnomon on two brass plates on the pedestal that marked off the days of the year: given the date, one could calculate when noon would be, or, at noon, one could figure out the date. It was engineered by Jacoby to be accurate to within a fraction of a minute. The strange functionality of the sundial was often a subject of student confusion; a 1932 article in the ''
Columbia Daily Spectator The ''Columbia Daily Spectator'' (known colloquially as the ''Spec'') is the student newspaper of Columbia University. Founded in 1877, it is the oldest continuously operating college news daily in the nation after ''The Harvard Crimson'', and has ...
'' quipped that the only way to actually tell the time using it was to "stand on the pedestal and look over at the clock between
Hartley Hartley may refer to: Places Australia *Hartley, New South Wales *Hartley, South Australia **Electoral district of Hartley, a state electoral district Canada *Hartley Bay, British Columbia United Kingdom *Hartley, Cumbria *Hartley, Plymou ...
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References

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