The Smith Alumnae Gymnasium is a historic former athletic facility on the

Smith College Smith College is a Private university, private Liberal arts colleges in the United States, liberal arts Women's colleges in the United States, women's college in Northampton, Massachusetts. It was chartered in 1871 by Sophia Smith (Smith College ...

campus in

Northampton, Massachusetts The city of Northampton is the county seat of Hampshire County, Massachusetts, United States. As of the 2020 census, the population of Northampton (including its outer villages, Florence and Leeds) was 29,571. Northampton is known as an acade ...

. Located facing Burton Lawn, it was built in 1890 as a fine addition to the adjacent Gothic style buildings. The building now houses the college's archives, and was connected by the adjacent Neilson Library by a bridge in 1982. It is the first place in which a formal

women's basketball Women's basketball is the team sport of basketball played by women. It began being played in 1892, one year after men's basketball, at Smith College in Massachusetts. It spread across the United States, in large part via women's college compet ...

game was played, in 1892, and is one of the first American athletic facilities built specifically for women. The building was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1976.

Description and history

The former Smith Alumnae Gymnasium is located in the central part of the Smith College Campus, immediately south of Neilson Library and north of Green Street. It faces the college's Burton Lawn, along with other buildings of the campus that were designed by Peabody & Stearns. It is built out of red brick with brownstone trim, with Late Gothic style that complements the surrounding buildings. Its main roofline is steeply pitched and hipped, with a small square cupola with flared roof at the center. From the main roof, a series of gabled and hip-roofed sections project, as do several smaller hip-roofed dormers. Most windows are rectangulas sash, but there are round-arch windows which illuminate the projecting stairwells. The gymnasium was built in 1890 to a design by

William C. Brocklesby William C. Brocklesby (1847-1910) was an American architect practicing in Hartford, Connecticut. Life and career William Claiborne Brocklesby was born May 28, 1847, in Hartford, Connecticut."John Brocklesby," in ''Biographical and Historical Reco ...

Hartford, Connecticut Hartford is the capital city of the U.S. state of Connecticut. It was the seat of Hartford County until Connecticut disbanded county government in 1960. It is the core city in the Greater Hartford metropolitan area. Census estimates since the ...

. It replaced an older wood-frame structure that was part of the original Peabody & Stearns plan for the campus, and was built in 1879. Brocklesby is credited with the design of nine buildings on the Smith campus. It was here that Senda Berenson Abbott, the college's directory of physical education, adapted the then-new game of basketball for women, and where the first formal women's basketball game was played. In the 1970s, the school first planned to demolish the building as part of a planned expansion of Neilson Library. This was protested by the campus community, and was eventually replaced by a proposal to move the building to make way for the expansion. In 1982, the building underwent renovation, and was connected to the library via a bridge.

Gallery

File:Smith Alumnae Gymnasium, Smith College, Northampton MA.jpg, Smith Alumnae Gymnasium (2012) File:Smith College Gymnasium, c.1890 (cropped).jpg, Original 1879 gymnasium designed by Peabody & Stearns

References

{{National Register of Historic Places in Massachusetts Smith College Buildings and structures in Northampton, Massachusetts Infrastructure completed in 1890 University and college buildings on the National Register of Historic Places in Massachusetts National Register of Historic Places in Hampshire County, Massachusetts Sports venues in Hampshire County, Massachusetts

Description and history

Gallery

See also

References