OSU Athletics
Just One More 130 Million Dollar Gem
Part One
By John PorentasThis story begins in 1932, and ends with a new beginning in 2005.
In 1932 the Ohio State University, under the guidance of Director of Athletics Lynn St. John, constructed the finest on-campus swimming facility in the country, Larkins Hall, later re-named the Mike Peppe Natatorium after legendary OSU swimming coach Mike Peppe.
"In it's day it was the best aquatic center in America," said current OSU Men's Swimming Coach Bill Wadley.
"It was the first deep-water pool in America, seven feet deep in the shallow end, and they didn't build pools that were seven feet deep in the shallow end in 1932. Someone had some great foresight.
"The depth of the pool is a real significant factor. Any turbulence in the pool affects times," said Wadley. "In a deep pool, the turbulence is dissipated before it gets back to the surface, so the pool stays calmer and is faster."
Larkins opened in 1932, and coincided with the hiring of Peppe as OSU's swimming coach. The combination of the best pool in the nation and a dynamic, aggressive coach led to great things in Ohio State swimming. Peppe attracted the best swimmers from across the nation and as far away as Hawaii to Ohio State. Peppe and his Buckeyes won a National Championship in 1942 and dominated swimming for the next 20 years.
"The last national championship team was in 1962. Mike Peppe retired the following year. They won 11 titles from 1942 through 1962," said Wadley.
"Not only did they win 11 NCAA national titles, but they also won 20 or 23 U.S.A. national titles. They were putting people on Olympic teams and breaking national records. The greatest swimmers and greatest divers in America at that time were coming to Ohio State," said Wadley.
"In the 60s a lot of things changed. One of them was that Mike Peppe retired. The other thing was that the pool at Larkins was 30 years old. It went from the state of the art best facility to an older pool. At that same time schools in the South and Far West began having swimming programs. Until then all the competitive swimming on the college level was in the Ivy League and the Big Ten," Wadley said.
Peppe Natatorium had seen it's better day, and facilities in the rest of the country were catching up. So too did the competition, and the golden ear of Ohio State swimming came to a close. The Buckeyes have not won a national championship in a sport the once dominated in 43 years.
"We were 22nd in the NCAAs this year on the men's side. In my 16 years here we've been a top 25 team for 11 or 12 of those years. We've been competitive, but certainly not where we want to be or are going to be," said Wadley.
In 1994, one Ferdinand August "Andy" Geiger took over the reigns as Ohio State's seventh Director of Athletics. In Geiger's very first year, Wadley pointed out the deficiencies of the swimming facilities to Geiger, and Geiger agreed that something needed to be done.
St. John was a believer in providing the finest facilities possible so many years earlier, and Geiger proved to be the same kind of man. His achievements in facility upgrades at Ohio State need no further testimony than the update of Ohio Stadium, The Jerome Schottenstein Center, Bill Davis Stadium and the Jesse Owens Track facility. All are magnificent works. Wadley and Geiger shared that same kind of vision for a new aquatic center, one that would set the standard for the rest of the collegiate swimming world as Larkins had in 1932.
From Concept to Reality
The quest to build a new aquatics center and student activity center began shortly after that first meeting between Geiger and Wadley.
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The "Recreation and Physical Activity Center" (RPAC) is one of four new buildings in the complex. Photo by Jim Davidson |
"We started in 1994," said Wadley. "We had a two-year feasibility study."
The study showed that the University would be best served with a facility that not only met the needs of the athletic department for a competition facility, but one that would serve the general student populace as well in the form of a student activity center that would encompass not only aquatics, but the entire spectrum of student exercise activities. The role of representative of the athletic department in the undertaking fell on the shoulders of Associate Director of Athletics Miechelle Willis.
"When Paul Krebs was the senior associate AD here he was working on the Schottenstein Center when we started talking about this aquatics and recreation center," said Willis.
"He came to me and said that since all the aquatics sports report to me, this would be a good project for me to be involved with, so I was involved from the very beginning right after the feasibility study and it was determined that we were going to build a rec facility with an aquatic center."
"We had input from physical education as to what they needed to have for their classes in things like swimming and scuba diving. We had input from student recreation as to what they wanted for recreation and leisure. Athletics was involved as well. We came up with all these great ideas, then in the next two years they tried to figure out what it would cost and how to pay for it," Willis said.
Everyone had their say, and the concept for a world-class facility evolved. The next step was to get something down on paper.
"We had a design team that was put together and had a representative from recreational sports, PAES (physical activity exercise services), the old physical education, someone from student affairs, and someone from athletics," said Willis.
"As a team we interviewed the design architect, the architect of record, the local architect, and some other people. Then we met with the design architect and talked about what we wanted the building to be."
The team eventually settled on New Mexico based Antoine Predock as the architect, and work was begun on the specifics of the facility.
"We worked with him and toured other facilities around the country," said Willis.
The concept that evolved was for a 580,000 square foot complex that would include four separate structures called the Recreation and Physical Activities Center (RPAC). One structure in the complex would house the student activity center, another the competitive pool, another the leisure and student activity pools, and the last an academic wing with classroom facilities. The two structures housing the pools comprise the McCorkle Aquatics Pavillion at RPAC. The entire complex would surround an outdoor courtyard, but all four buildings would be interconnected by tunnels that would turn four separate buildings into one enormous complex.
With the initial drawings came the initial estimate of costs, and the members of the OSU committee overseeing the project got an early case of sticker shock.
"Our budget for the entire facility was 130 million dollars. I think the first go-round came in at 160 million dollars, so we had to chip away at it," said Willis.
Part II Tomorrow - Making the Dream come true and a comprehensive photo gallery.
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