Saturday, May 20, 2000

May 2000 Regents Report

A contract for a new $8.7 million classroom/office building and the first stage of a $1 million Sam Houston Memorial Museum exhibits renovation were approved Friday by the Sam Houston State University board of regents, according to Today@Sam:

The new four-story building will contain 62,000 square feet of space for the departments of history, library science, and psychology, as well as a computer laboratory, testing center, honors laboratory, and reading, writing and learning enrichment center. It will contain a 300 seat lecture hall. The construction contract was awarded to ICI Construction Inc., of Spring. Work is expected to begin about Aug. 1, with completion in the fall of 2001.

Southwest Museum Services of Houston was hired to begin the first phase of a project estimated to eventually cost $1,050,000, to completely re-design the exhibits area of the Sam Houston Memorial Museum. The first phase will cost $250,000 and will be limited to the rotunda area. The centerpiece of the rotunda will be a scaled-down copy of David Adickes' 67-foot statue of Sam Houston, located on Interstate 45 in south Huntsville. Also in the rotunda will be dioramas depicting Sam Houston as a youth, Houston at the Battle of Horseshoe Bend, and Houston as president of the Republic of Texas.