East Hall

Whenever my brother visits from Washington we make a trip up to our old campus - Western Michigan University in Kalamazoo, MI. One of the spots we liked to hang out when we both attended together was on the steps of East Hall, an original campus building (built in 1904). The building was mostly defunct by the time we attended school. It was nonetheless awesome and had great views of the city of Kalamazoo and even fireworks during baseball season. It was also creepy and cool inside. The building was an art student hangout, held archives, and had several creepy old bathrooms. The moped army made a few sweeps through there every night too. Needless to say, I have great memories of the place. My dad sent out this picture to the family a few months ago and it was perfect timing as WMU is tearing down a big chunk of East Hall and the surrounding historic buildings this month. Read more about it here. Here is my grandma in front of East Hall back in the 1940's. 

My grandma earned her BA and MA from WMU back in the 40's and 50's. 

And East Hall a week or so ago when we visited: 

The good news is it sounds like they are saving at least some of it for an alumni center and if I know alumni centers, I know they mean big buck$, so I'm sure that part will be nicely restored. I'm still sad to see the crumbling old hangout as I knew it go.