Stanford University Department of Physics - Bloch Auditorium: The End of an Era

The End of an Era

The forty-year old Bloch Auditorium, also known as the Physics "tank", has been demolished in anticipation of a new regional teaching facilty, currently under construction. The new facility will be located in the space which was formerly a parking lot in front of the Varian building. The newly cleared site will be redesigned to form a pathway linking the Inner Quad to the new Science and Engineering Quadrangle, which is scheduled for completion in 1998.

The tank was built in 1957, and following a renovation project in 1992, it was dedicated as the Felix Bloch Auditorium. Bloch, who died in 1983, taught at Stanford for fifty years and in 1952, became the university's first Nobel laureate. A metal plaque commemorating Professor Bloch and his scientific achievements will be hung in a classroom in the new SEQ teaching facility when it opens. Physics will share the new facility with the biology and chemistry departments. Construction delays have created some challenges for physics faculty, who are using videotaped demonstrations and occupying classrooms scattered throughout the campus until the new facility is ready to occupy.

Barring further delays, the new teaching facility should be ready for use at the beginning of winter quarter. The McCullough renovation and McCullough Annex construction (advanced materials research building) have begun in earnest, so that we are now surrounded on three sides by active construction projects! However, when complete, these new facilities will improve both the classroom instruction and the research efforts within the Department.

For tank images:

All 8 pictures, full size

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