The Old Administration Building, 1891-1906

With an exterior of red brick and an interior of California redwood and native tamarack, the Old Administration building (commonly called the Old Admin) was the center of the University of Idaho campus during its first years in operation. The building consisted of three-stories with a basement, cost $131,068, and included a steeple on the central section that stood 168 feet.

Construction on the building was completed in 1892. In 1896, the first four graduates of UI received their degrees in its Auditorium. Sadly, the Old Admin would not stand for long.

In the very early morning hours of March 30, 1906, the Old Admin was fully engulfed in flames. Through the combined efforts of administration, faculty, staff, and students some small pieces of the University of Idaho’s beginnings were saved. Dean Jay Glover Eldridge climbed a ladder into his office and threw entire drawers of documents to Judge Roland Hodgins (pioneer and proprietor of Hodgin’s Drug Store) who then gathered them from where they fluttered. Students managed to save the “Silver and Gold Book” which was a jeweled box gifted to the University from the women of Moscow and a stuffed mountain goat. The university library was housed in the Old Admin and the majority of the books Miss Belle Sweet the University Librarian had managed to organize were lost. President James A. MacLean, a volunteer with the West Side Hose Company No. 4, could do nothing but watch as the heart of the UI campus was lost. As light came the next day, the once attractive edifice of education was nothing more than a blackened skeletal walls and wet rubble. A feeling of mourning descended on the UI campus. Although arson was suspected nothing was ever proven.