The Food Sciences Building, formerly known as Dairy Industry Building, is a historic building on the campus of

Iowa State University Iowa State University of Science and Technology (Iowa State University, Iowa State, or ISU) is a public land-grant research university in Ames, Iowa. Founded in 1858 as the Iowa Agricultural College and Model Farm, Iowa State became one of the n ...

Ames, Iowa Ames () is a city in Story County, Iowa, United States, located approximately north of Des Moines in central Iowa. It is best known as the home of Iowa State University (ISU), with leading agriculture, design, engineering, and veterinary medici ...

, United States. The two-story,

Bedford stone Indiana limestone — also known as Bedford limestone in the building trade — has long been an economically important building material, particularly for monumental public structures. Indiana limestone is a more common term for Salem Limestone, ...

structure was designed by the

Des Moines Des Moines () is the capital and the most populous city in the U.S. state of Iowa. It is also the county seat of Polk County. A small part of the city extends into Warren County. It was incorporated on September 22, 1851, as Fort Des Moines, ...

architectural firm of

Proudfoot, Rawson & Souers Proudfoot & Bird was an American architectural firm that designed many buildings throughout the Midwest region of the United States. Originally established in 1882, it remains active through its several successors, and since 2017 has been known as ...

. with J. and W. A. Elliott Construction completed it in 1928. Additions to the original building were completed in 1962, 1991, and 1993. It was listed, along with its courtyard sculptures, on the

National Register of Historic Places The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the United States federal government's official list of districts, sites, buildings, structures and objects deemed worthy of preservation for their historical significance or "great artistic v ...

in 1987.

Christian Petersen Courtyard Sculptures

The building itself is not as significant as the

Depression era The Great Depression (19291939) was an economic shock that impacted most countries across the world. It was a period of economic depression that became evident after a major fall in stock prices in the United States. The economic contagio ...

artwork contained within it. Christian Petersen, a

Danish Danish may refer to: * Something of, from, or related to the country of Denmark People * A national or citizen of Denmark, also called a "Dane," see Demographics of Denmark * Culture of Denmark * Danish people or Danes, people with a Danish ance ...

immigrant, designed and completed the nine

bas relief Relief is a sculptural method in which the sculpted pieces are bonded to a solid background of the same material. The term ''relief'' is from the Latin verb ''relevo'', to raise. To create a sculpture in relief is to give the impression that the ...

s from 1934 to 1935 as part of the

Public Works of Art Project The Public Works of Art Project (PWAP) was a New Deal program designed to employ artists that operated from 1933 to 1934. The program was headed by Edward Bruce, under the United States Treasury Department with funding from the Civil Works Admin ...

(PWPA). Two plaster-cast panels are located in the

foyer A lobby is a room in a building used for entry from the outside. Sometimes referred to as a foyer, reception area or an entrance hall, it is often a large room or complex of rooms (in a theatre, opera house, concert hall, showroom, cinema, etc. ...

. One depicts a woman from biblical times churning butter in a goatskin bag hung from a tree, and the other depicts an American pioneer women using a dash churn, an early American invention. They were completed in 1934. The seven courtyard bas reliefs were designed in an

Iowa City Iowa City, offically the City of Iowa City is a city in Johnson County, Iowa, United States. It is the home of the University of Iowa and county seat of Johnson County, at the center of the Iowa City Metropolitan Statistical Area. At the time ...

workshop, and the

terra cotta Terracotta, terra cotta, or terra-cotta (; ; ), in its material sense as an earthenware substrate, is a clay-based unglazed or glazed ceramic where the fired body is porous. In applied art, craft, construction, and architecture, terracotta ...

panels were created using a

kiln A kiln is a thermally insulated chamber, a type of oven, that produces temperatures sufficient to complete some process, such as hardening, drying, or chemical changes. Kilns have been used for millennia to turn objects made from clay int ...

designed by Paul E. Cox, a professor of ceramic engineering at what was then Iowa State College. The use of terra cotta for the panels was rare by the 1930s. The central panel depicts three Jersey cows and a bull located above the basin of a semicircular double-tiered fountain that flows into a reflecting pool. The panels on the left depict the early American era of hand milking, transporting the raw milk by wagon to the market, separating milk, and butter churning. The panels on the right depict the modern (1934) dairy plant at Iowa State. They include scenes of mechanical milking machines, a "Babcock" testing machine and a power centrifugal separator, and equipment for present-day pasteurizing, cooling, and cheesemaking. Professor Martin Mortensen, who was the head of the Dairy Industry department, assisted with the portrayal of dairy technology. Professor Maurice Hanson of the landscape architecture department designed the gravel walkways and plantings in the courtyard. The PWPA in Iowa was directed by the regionalist painter

Grant Wood Grant DeVolson Wood (February 13, 1891 February 12, 1942) was an American painter and representative of Regionalism, best known for his paintings depicting the rural American Midwest. He is particularly well known for '' American Gothic'' (193 ...

. Petersen was the only sculptor in the Iowa program. He became the sculptor-in-residence at the university, and his art is found mainly in

Iowa Iowa () is a state in the Midwestern region of the United States, bordered by the Mississippi River to the east and the Missouri River and Big Sioux River to the west. It is bordered by six states: Wisconsin to the northeast, Illinois to the ...

. The sculptures themselves are rare examples of federally subsidized art on a

Midwest The Midwestern United States, also referred to as the Midwest or the American Midwest, is one of four Census Bureau Region, census regions of the United States Census Bureau (also known as "Region 2"). It occupies the northern central part of ...

ern college campus. PWPA sculptures are generally found in large cities on both the east and west coasts.

References

{{NRHP in Story County, Iowa School buildings completed in 1928 University and college buildings on the National Register of Historic Places in Iowa Neoclassical architecture in Iowa Iowa State University buildings and structures National Register of Historic Places in Story County, Iowa Public Works of Art Project Outdoor sculptures in Iowa 1928 establishments in Iowa

Christian Petersen Courtyard Sculptures

See also

References