The University of Utah Medical Center was a multi-year project: from concept discussion (1945) until opening (1965). This page covers the timeline up-to-and-including the concept approval in early 1959.

The University of Utah Medical School opened in 1905 and for many years followed a ‘brains not bricks’ motto, prioritizing faculty appointments, not buildings. By the 1940s the school was housed in 19 structures, including the main teaching hospital at the Salt Lake County General Hospital. Medical students complained about “leaking ceilings, panhandlers, and spartan accommodations” and “accreditors threatened to shut down the College of Medicine” (Mruk; Oliver).

Discussions promoting a unified medical center (teaching, clinical practice, and research) began post-war (1945-6) and ten acres of land was acquired to the east of Fort Douglas for a medical campus.

By 1956, medical school leadership had obtained $6 million from state and federal sources to build a new medical center (… and here’s). It was expected that the remaining $4 million would be raised from corporations, foundations, medical professionals, and alumni (Patrick, 1958).

We don’t know exactly when AEB became involved. Dr. Price (1969), Dean of the School of Medicine, notes that it was early in the process. We started “on a shoestring, developing plans. …[and] owe a great deal to Bud Brazier… who for many years worked with us without a cent of pay, helping to begin initial plans which eventually developed into the present Medical Center.” Mruk dates the initial AEB appointment to 1949, though it wasn’t until 1957 that the Utah Building Board announced that Ashton, Evans & Brazier had been “tentatively …offer[ed] a contract for the … Medical Center … subject to further negotiation” (Architects given).

In 1957 Brazier and members of the planning committee toured university medical centers across the country. During this time, Dr. Price and others became increasingly dissatisfied with AEB’s initial plan: “not a great building from an architectural standpoint” (Mruk). As a result, William Wurster from Berkeley was brought in to work with AEB.

“[This] was a classic contest between … form or beauty [Wurster] and pragmatics [Brazier].” Brazier and Wurster did agree on some design elements: 1) bricks would be used to promote “a visual kinship” with the rest of campus; 2) western exposure would be limited to keep the buildings cool; 3) three sections would represent the three goals (basic science research, clinical research, and teaching) (Mruk).

In parallel to these meetings, the publicity machine was working overtime. In August 1958 the $4 million private fund-raising campaign began, and the first architect’s sketch was published. Another drawing was published in essentially every Utah newspaper in January 1959. With this rendering, AEB stated “the Medical Center … will not be a fancy or costly structure. Instead it will be a rather plain highly-functional service unit” (U. Medical Center).

Clad in campus brick, the final concept adopted Modernist lines: a horizontal profile accentuated by bands of windows set off above and below by porcelain-enamel panels. “Its most notable feature was a balcony supported by slender white columns and faced with a screen of perforated white—a distinctly New Formalist element” (Oliver).

As the concept was finalized (1959), Brazier established an office on campus to conduct detail design meetings with faculty. These will be covered in a separate post. As a point of reference, the medical center wouldn’t open for six more years.