- Other names
- Aycock Dormitory
- Built
- 1960
- Construction cost
- $1.1 million
- Gross sq. ft.
- 89,516
- Assignable sq. ft.
- 69,239
- Architects
- Eric Flannagan, Henderson NC
- Namesake
- Charles Brantley Aycock (1859-1912): Perhaps the greatest tribute to Charles Brantley Aycock is not that he was Governor from 1901 to 1905. The fact that he is almost universally admitted to have been “the best loved North Carolinian of his generation” is a tribute he would much more highly prized.
The statistical facts about him may be briefly summarized. He was born November 1, 1859, on a Wayne County farm. His parents were plain people, but ambitious, industrious, and independent. His father was for eight years clerk of the court, and in 1864-65, an outstanding member of the North Carolina State Senate.Young Aycock was educated at the Wilson Collegiate Institute and the Joseph H. Foy School in Kinston, and later distinguished himself as a debater at the University of North Carolina. Admitted to the bar in 1881, he was thereafter almost equally known as an outstanding attorney and as a leader in the State Democratic campaigns.
In 1900, he was elected Governor. Both in his pre-election campaign and through his whole term as Governor and afterward he became the foremost North Carolina champion of “universal education.” Even earlier as a member fo the Goldsboro school board he had faced the problems of local education. “Public schools must be provided,” he insisted, “for both races and equally for poor children and wealthier.” This cause, which won him national fame as the State’s “Educational Governor,” still had the foremost place in his interests when he died suddenly from a heart attack while addressing the Alabama Educational Association in Birmingham April 4, 1912. Most fittingly there is carved upon his monument in Raleigh the words he had written for an address in which he had planned ot announce a few days later his candidacy for the United States Senate:
Equal! That is the word! On that word I plant
myself and my party — to the equal right of
every child born on earth to have the opportunity
to burgeon out all that there is within him!Information copied from Aycock dedication program in CH1050, Series 3, Sub-series 6, Chancellor’s Administrative File.
- History
- The second dormitory built on “the Hill,” Aycock houses 520 students and contains 90,000 square feet. The H-shaped building was designed with brick exterior walls and concrete block interior walls, and was originally built as a strictly male residence hall. It features a small recreation center in the basement, the only residence hall to do so.
- Additions
- 1970 – interior painting, Lan-way Coating Company
1989 – $314,500 refurbishing project approved1993 – $331,500 spent on reroofing and $70,000 spent on installation of fluorescent light fixtures
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