The Hub is a historic building on the

University of Florida The University of Florida (Florida or UF) is a public university, public land-grant university, land-grant research university in Gainesville, Florida, United States. It is a senior member of the State University System of Florida and a preem ...

campus in Gainesville,

Florida Florida ( ; ) is a U.S. state, state in the Southeastern United States, Southeastern region of the United States. It borders the Gulf of Mexico to the west, Alabama to the northwest, Georgia (U.S. state), Georgia to the north, the Atlantic ...

in the

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. It is located on Stadium Road between Buckman Drive and Fletcher Drive. On June 24, 2008, it was added to the

National Register of Historic Places The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the Federal government of the United States, United States federal government's official United States National Register of Historic Places listings, list of sites, buildings, structures, Hist ...

History

Early history

The Hub was built in 1949-1950 after being designed by Andrew Ferendino of the

Miami Miami is a East Coast of the United States, coastal city in the U.S. state of Florida and the county seat of Miami-Dade County, Florida, Miami-Dade County in South Florida. It is the core of the Miami metropolitan area, which, with a populat ...

architectural firm In the United States, an architectural firm or architecture firm is a business that employs one or more licensed architects and practices the profession of architecture; while in South Africa, the United Kingdom, Ireland, Denmark and other countr ...

Russell Pancoast Russell Pancoast (February 13, 1899 – November 28, 1972) was an American architect and city planner who designed hundreds of buildings throughout Florida and the city master plan for Plantation, Florida. He and his father, Thomas J. Pancoast ...

and Associates, as directed by

Florida Board of Control The Florida Board of Control (1905–1965) was the statewide governing body for the State University System of Florida, which included all public universities in the state of Florida. It was replaced by the Florida Board of Regents in 1965.< ...

architect

Guy Fulton Guy Chandler Fulton (October 27, 1892 – October 15, 1974) was an American architect known for his work on numerous buildings at the University of Florida while he was State Architect of Florida. Early life Fulton was born in Warsaw, Illinois ...

and UF's consulting architect Jefferson Hamilton. It was UF's first departure from the

Collegiate Gothic Collegiate Gothic is an architectural style subgenre of Gothic Revival architecture, popular in the late-19th and early-20th centuries for college and high school buildings in the United States and Canada, and to a certain extent Europ ...

architectural style An architectural style is a classification of buildings (and nonbuilding structures) based on a set of characteristics and features, including overall appearance, arrangement of the components, method of construction, building materials used, for ...

that had prevailed on the campus since the first buildings, Buckman and

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, were built in 1905. During its design phase, the Hub was briefly known as the Student Services Center. Around the time of its grand opening, it was renamed ''the Hub'' by students after a campus-wide contest.

Change in services

The Hub originally housed the campus

bookstore Bookselling is the commercial trading of books, which is the retail and distribution end of the publishing process. People who engage in bookselling are called booksellers, bookdealers, book people, bookmen, or bookwomen. History The found ...

post office A post office is a public facility and a retailer that provides mail services, such as accepting letter (message), letters and parcel (package), parcels, providing post office boxes, and selling postage stamps, packaging, and stationery. Post o ...

, barber shop,

soda fountain A soda fountain is a device that dispenses carbonated soft drinks, called fountain drinks. They can be found in restaurants, concession stands and other locations such as convenience stores. The machine combines flavored syrup or syrup concentrat ...

, and

movie theater A movie theater (American English) or cinema (English in the Commonwealth of Nations, Commonwealth English), also known as a movie house, cinema hall, picture house, picture theater, the movies, the pictures, or simply theater, is a business ...

. Prior to moving to the J. Wayne Reitz Union in 2003, the university's bookstore and ID card services were both located at the Hub. A small

food court A food court (in Asia-Pacific also called food hall or hawker centre) is generally an indoor plaza or common area within a facility that is contiguous with the counters of multiple food Vendor, vendors and provides a common area for self-serve di ...

was set up on the first floor and the "Technology Hub" selling computer accessories and software was on the second floor.

Renovations

In 2005, the Hub began undergoing a $10.8 million

renovation Renovation (also called remodeling) is the process of improving broken, damaged, or outdated structures. Renovations are typically done on either commercial or residential buildings. Additionally, renovation can refer to making something new, o ...

and was later reopened in April 2007. The renovation added various

computer A computer is a machine that can be Computer programming, programmed to automatically Execution (computing), carry out sequences of arithmetic or logical operations (''computation''). Modern digital electronic computers can perform generic set ...

and

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equipment, a open

wireless Internet Wireless communication (or just wireless, when the context allows) is the transfer of information (''telecommunication'') between two or more points without the use of an electrical conductor, optical fiber or other continuous guided mediu ...

area, a

Starbucks Starbucks Corporation is an American multinational List of coffeehouse chains, chain of coffeehouses and Starbucks Reserve, roastery reserves headquartered in Seattle, Washington. It was founded in 1971 by Jerry Baldwin, Zev Siegl, and Gor ...

, a

Chick-fil-A Chick-fil-A, Inc. ( , a Word play, play on the American English pronunciation of "wikt:filet#Pronunciation, filet") is an American fast food restaurant chain and the largest chain specializing in Chicken burger, chicken sandwiches. Headquarter ...

, and group and individual study rooms. The Office of Academic Technology and the International Center (

study abroad International students or exchange students, also known as foreign students, are students who undertake all or part of their secondary or tertiary education in a country other than their own. In 2022, there were over 6.9 million international ...

) moved to the Hub following the renovation.

References

National Register of Historic Places in Gainesville, Florida Buildings at the University of Florida Guy Fulton buildings University and college buildings on the National Register of Historic Places in Florida 1950 establishments in Florida University and college buildings completed in 1950 {{AlachuaCountyFL-NRHP-stub

History

Early history

Change in services

Renovations

See also

References