It was curiosity that lead Matt Scheidt to crawl into a brick hole in the Rotunda's wall.
Scheidt, a project manager for John G. Waite Associates, specializes in historic buildings. He is overseeing the renovation of the University of Virginia Rotunda and wanted to know how thick the walls were.
"I was laying on my back looking up inside this little space. I saw that there was a piece of cut stone which is very unusual to have in this location. You could see that there was a square cut in the stone and that there was a finished space around that with plaster and painted walls," Scheidt said.
Upon further investigation, he realized he uncovered a piece of history. A chemistry lab designed by Thomas Jefferson and built in the early 1820s, toward the end of the Rotunda's construction.
Two brick niches were uncovered during renovations in the 1970s, but researchers didn't realized there was more to the work space.
"The experiments would be done at the higher level where the stone is almost like a counter top, there may have been an iron plate or grill there," said Scheidt.
Even more astonishing, the lab was preserved for nearly 200 years by accident, after it was bricked up in 1840 when teaching styles became more sophisticated.
"Just because of luck and geometry of the building, because it was bricked up, it survived the major fire in 1895, and it survived the major renovation in the 1970s, mostly because people didn't know it was there," Scheidt said.
The surprise discovery became even more significant when researchers realized it was the only one left from its time in the world.
"It was during the period where chemistry was beginning to be taught and people were starting to do more experiments. It's very unique because there's certainly documentation that there were chemical hearths like this in other places, especially in Europe but they are all mostly destroyed," said Scheidt. "There is one or two left in Europe, and then this one."
There are no plans to renovate or restore the lab because of its significance. When the Rotunda reopens to the public in 2016, the lab will be part of an exhibit in the building's visitors center.
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The chemical hearth may have been closed up in the wall in the mid-1840s when the chemistry laboratory was moved to the southwest wing of the Rotunda.
As a part of the ongoing renovation at the University of Virginia, conservators have discovered a well-preserved chemical hearth, which is believed to be part of an early science classroom.
Brian Hogg, senior historic preservation planner in the Office of the Architect for the University, is of the opinion that the chemical hearth may have been for John Emmet, the first professor of natural history, and his students may have had portable hearths with which they conducted experiments.
The chemical hearth was built as a semi-circular niche in the north end of the Lower East Oval Room. Two fireboxes provided heat (one burning wood for fuel, the other burning coal), underground brick tunnels fed fresh air to fireboxes and workstations, and flues carried away the fumes and smoke. Students worked at five workstations cut into stone countertops.
In Thomas Jefferson’s original Rotunda, the teaching of chemistry occurred on the Rotunda’s bottom floor – laboratory experiments and demonstrations in the Lower East Oval Room and lectures in the Lower West Oval Room. Emmet, who collaborated with University founder Thomas Jefferson to equip the space, taught the classes.
“Back then, the different experiments would get different levels of heat from different sources,” said Jody Lahendro, a supervisory historic preservation architect for U.Va.’s Facilities Management. “For some, they would put the heat source under a layer of sand to more evenly disperse and temper the heat.”
Jefferson understood the chemistry room would pose special circumstances and proposed, in an April 1823 letter to Joseph Cabell, a member of the Board of Visitors, that the class be located on the ground floor of the Rotunda – a common practice then so that the water required in the experiments would not have to be pumped to the upper floors.
“For the Professor of Chemistry, such experiments as require the use of furnaces, cannot be exhibited in his ordinary lecturing room,” Jefferson wrote. “We therefore prepare the rooms under the oval rooms of the ground floor of the Rotunda for furnaces, stoves &c. These rooms are of 1,000 square feet area each.”
In October 1824, the Board of Visitors determined Rotunda room use, stating the “rooms in the Basement story of the Rotunda, shall be, one of them for a Chemical laboratory; and the others for any necessary purpose to which they may be adapted.”
Emmet, who started teaching at the University in April 1825, was initially given a small room on the north side of the building for his first chemical laboratory. He complained the room was too small to properly dissipate heat, making it too hot from the chemical experiments he was running.
Jefferson agreed in June that year to let Emmet use both of the larger rooms in the Rotunda’s basement for his chemistry classes – one for a laboratory and one for a lecture hall. According to correspondence between Jefferson and Emmet, the professor believed the students needed to be able to perform their own experiments to learn chemistry, not just watch the professor.
The chemical laboratory facilities in the Lower East Oval Room were modeled in part after a chemical laboratory in the College of Physicians and Surgeons in New York City, a lab run by William J. MacNeven, Emmet’s mentor.
“The surviving evidence of the chemical hearth in the Rotunda bears similarities to the range of furnaces in the MacNeven laboratory,” according to a report written by Diane S. Waite for John G. Waite Associates, Architects, the firm that designed the current Rotunda renovations.
Scheidt, a project manager for John G. Waite Associates, specializes in historic buildings. He is overseeing the renovation of the University of Virginia Rotunda and wanted to know how thick the walls were.
"I was laying on my back looking up inside this little space. I saw that there was a piece of cut stone which is very unusual to have in this location. You could see that there was a square cut in the stone and that there was a finished space around that with plaster and painted walls," Scheidt said.
Upon further investigation, he realized he uncovered a piece of history. A chemistry lab designed by Thomas Jefferson and built in the early 1820s, toward the end of the Rotunda's construction.
Two brick niches were uncovered during renovations in the 1970s, but researchers didn't realized there was more to the work space.
"The experiments would be done at the higher level where the stone is almost like a counter top, there may have been an iron plate or grill there," said Scheidt.
Even more astonishing, the lab was preserved for nearly 200 years by accident, after it was bricked up in 1840 when teaching styles became more sophisticated.
"Just because of luck and geometry of the building, because it was bricked up, it survived the major fire in 1895, and it survived the major renovation in the 1970s, mostly because people didn't know it was there," Scheidt said.
The surprise discovery became even more significant when researchers realized it was the only one left from its time in the world.
"It was during the period where chemistry was beginning to be taught and people were starting to do more experiments. It's very unique because there's certainly documentation that there were chemical hearths like this in other places, especially in Europe but they are all mostly destroyed," said Scheidt. "There is one or two left in Europe, and then this one."
There are no plans to renovate or restore the lab because of its significance. When the Rotunda reopens to the public in 2016, the lab will be part of an exhibit in the building's visitors center.
________________________________________
The chemical hearth may have been closed up in the wall in the mid-1840s when the chemistry laboratory was moved to the southwest wing of the Rotunda.
As a part of the ongoing renovation at the University of Virginia, conservators have discovered a well-preserved chemical hearth, which is believed to be part of an early science classroom.
Brian Hogg, senior historic preservation planner in the Office of the Architect for the University, is of the opinion that the chemical hearth may have been for John Emmet, the first professor of natural history, and his students may have had portable hearths with which they conducted experiments.
The chemical hearth was built as a semi-circular niche in the north end of the Lower East Oval Room. Two fireboxes provided heat (one burning wood for fuel, the other burning coal), underground brick tunnels fed fresh air to fireboxes and workstations, and flues carried away the fumes and smoke. Students worked at five workstations cut into stone countertops.
In Thomas Jefferson’s original Rotunda, the teaching of chemistry occurred on the Rotunda’s bottom floor – laboratory experiments and demonstrations in the Lower East Oval Room and lectures in the Lower West Oval Room. Emmet, who collaborated with University founder Thomas Jefferson to equip the space, taught the classes.
“Back then, the different experiments would get different levels of heat from different sources,” said Jody Lahendro, a supervisory historic preservation architect for U.Va.’s Facilities Management. “For some, they would put the heat source under a layer of sand to more evenly disperse and temper the heat.”
Jefferson understood the chemistry room would pose special circumstances and proposed, in an April 1823 letter to Joseph Cabell, a member of the Board of Visitors, that the class be located on the ground floor of the Rotunda – a common practice then so that the water required in the experiments would not have to be pumped to the upper floors.
“For the Professor of Chemistry, such experiments as require the use of furnaces, cannot be exhibited in his ordinary lecturing room,” Jefferson wrote. “We therefore prepare the rooms under the oval rooms of the ground floor of the Rotunda for furnaces, stoves &c. These rooms are of 1,000 square feet area each.”
In October 1824, the Board of Visitors determined Rotunda room use, stating the “rooms in the Basement story of the Rotunda, shall be, one of them for a Chemical laboratory; and the others for any necessary purpose to which they may be adapted.”
Emmet, who started teaching at the University in April 1825, was initially given a small room on the north side of the building for his first chemical laboratory. He complained the room was too small to properly dissipate heat, making it too hot from the chemical experiments he was running.
Jefferson agreed in June that year to let Emmet use both of the larger rooms in the Rotunda’s basement for his chemistry classes – one for a laboratory and one for a lecture hall. According to correspondence between Jefferson and Emmet, the professor believed the students needed to be able to perform their own experiments to learn chemistry, not just watch the professor.
The chemical laboratory facilities in the Lower East Oval Room were modeled in part after a chemical laboratory in the College of Physicians and Surgeons in New York City, a lab run by William J. MacNeven, Emmet’s mentor.
“The surviving evidence of the chemical hearth in the Rotunda bears similarities to the range of furnaces in the MacNeven laboratory,” according to a report written by Diane S. Waite for John G. Waite Associates, Architects, the firm that designed the current Rotunda renovations.