50@50: Naming FIU’s founding buildings

To celebrate the university’s 50th anniversary, FIU News is sharing 50 moments in FIU’s history as part of our “50@50″ series.

By Joel Delgado ’12 MS ’17 

Early in FIU’s history, before there was ever a student government, President Charles “Chuck” Perry established a committee that would serve as a mediator between the president and the student body.

Then-student Diane Spurlock ’75 was named the chair of the committee and one of the first items the committee was charged with was the naming of the university’s founding buildings. Hoping to reflect the international nature of the university and its student body, the committee helped name some of the university’s first buildings different languages:

• Primera Casa: Spanish for “first house.” Established in 1969, it was the first building constructed at FIU and President Perry addressed the university on the steps of PC the day FIU officially opened on Sept. 14, 1972.
• Deuxième Maison: French for “second house,” the building opened shortly after Primera Casa in response to the need for classroom space and currently is home to the Honors College and a number of other departments. DM recently underwent a courtyard transformation with the opening of the “Sky Lounge” in 2013.
• University House (now the Graham Center): Completed in 1974, the new student center was named by the committee in English and was the third structure completed at FIU. In its earliest days, the student center included the Rathskeller, a large cafeteria and “The Pit.”
• Viertes Haus: German for “fourth house,” it is currently home of the Photo Lab, Stable Isotope Lab and various studios and classrooms.
• Athenaeum (now the Green Library): The early version of the Greek word “Athenaeum” was applied to buildings in ancient Greece which were dedicated to Athena, the goddess of wisdom and the arts. The university’s new library was the fifth structure completed on campus.
• Owa Ehan: Opened in 1977, Owa Ehan means “six houses” (or a “collection of six houses”) in Edo, a language spoken primarily in southern Nigeria. It housed the first kitchen and dining room on campus, seating 45 for the School of Hotel, Food and Travel Services (now the Chaplin School of Hospitality and Tourism Management at Biscayne Bay Campus).

Related: The mystery of Owa Ehan solved

UPDATE: University House was added to the article as the third structure completed on campus. It was initially left out because we aimed to focus on the university’s first academic buildings, but felt the addition was necessary to make the article complete… Owa Ehan does not mean ‘fifth house’ in Swahili.