| Community Hall | |||||||||||||||||||
| Image Alt: | Front view of the building's exterior showing all three floors and the dense landscaping surrounding it | ||||||||||||||||||
| Mapframe-Custom: | Location of Community Hall | ||||||||||||||||||
| Former Names: | Administration Bldg. (1888–1947) Benton Hall (1947–2017) | ||||||||||||||||||
| Status: | built | ||||||||||||||||||
| Building Type: | School | ||||||||||||||||||
| Location: | College Hill | ||||||||||||||||||
| Address: | 1650 SW Pioneer Place | ||||||||||||||||||
| Altitude: | 240abbr=onNaNabbr=on | ||||||||||||||||||
| Current Tenants: | University music department | ||||||||||||||||||
| Cost: | $25,000 | ||||||||||||||||||
| Material: | Wood | ||||||||||||||||||
| Floor Count: | 3 | ||||||||||||||||||
| Floor Area: | 25806abbr=onNaNabbr=on | ||||||||||||||||||
| Elevator Count: | 1 | ||||||||||||||||||
| Architect: | Wilbur R. Boothby[1] | ||||||||||||||||||
| Other Designers: | Edgar M. Lazarus (1899 changes) | ||||||||||||||||||
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Community Hall (formerly the Administration Building, then Benton Hall) was the first building constructed on the Oregon State University campus in Corvallis, Oregon and the oldest structure on its campus today. Its original name was simply the "Administration Building" while the university itself was using the name under which it was first organized: Oregon State Agricultural College. It is situated on a gentle slope called "College Hill," just west of the city's commercial center on the west bank of the Willamette River, there anchoring what remains of the school's original buildings on the "Lower Campus" (given with current names and years built): Apperson Hall (1899), Benton Annex (1892), Education Hall (1902) and Gladys Valley Gymnastics Center (1898).
In 1860 a lien was placed on the first building to occupy the site, by a carpenter who had not been paid for his work. The ensuing sheriff's sale resulted in ownership of the building, the land and the school operating there (Corvallis College) transferring to Rev. Orceneth Fisher on behalf of the Methodist Episcopal Church South, where he served as pastor. By 1885, calls from local leaders were growing loud to convert it to a state institution which would be eligible for federal funds under the Morrill Land-Grant Acts and the church agreed to relinquish control.[2] In response, the Oregon State Legislature passed an act that reorganized the school as the state's agricultural college, but skeptical of the actual awarding of land-grant status it decided to require the citizens of Benton County to bear the full costs for the construction of a suitable building to house its offices, which the act required to be no less than $25,000 (equivalent to $675,000 in 2020), and if successful the building would become de jure property of the state upon completion through eminent domain.
The 1880 census had reported only 1,400 households within the entire county, but less than two years later the sum had been raised, permits secured and construction began on the building still standing today, largely unchanged, as Community Hall.[3] The cornerstone was laid by the Ancient Free and Accepted Masons of Oregon on August 17, 1887[4] and it officially opened in September 1889 at the start of the school's final academic year as the State Agricultural College of Oregon; it opened for the 1890 term as simply the Oregon Agricultural College.[5] [6]
On October 28, 1987, Governor Neil Goldschmidt signed a proclamation declaring the day as "Benton Hall Day".
Benton Hall was renamed Community Hall in November 2017.[7] [8]