Civilians are scarce around the Littauer Center for Public Administration today, as the old home of the Government and Economics Department now houses the Naval Training School (communications) and (Radar), as well as an Army Signal Corps group.
Planned first in 1935 the building is the gift of Lucius N. Littauer '78, who donated over $2,250,000 to construct a building to house all the social sciences. Littauer to house all the social sciences. Littauer, whose fortune is inherited from Gloversville, helped lay the cornerstone in 1938 and was present at the completion of the building.
In peacetime the Graduate School for Public Administration contained some 30 seekers after Ph.D., but wartime has eat their number to 20. The offices of the dean and secretary of the schiol are the only ones on the first floor today that are not "U.S. Navy Only."
The halls of Littauer are soundproofed, and all rooms are lit by the most modern kind of indirect lighting. The desks and chairs of the classrooms are unmarked, bare of the patina that weighs down those of Sever and the New Lecture Hall.
The Economics and Government departments still have their main offices on the second floor, where the chairman and secretary of each department directs the action of all social fronts. Also on the second floor are the seminar rooms, where the more advanced classes of the University social science program are held.
Library Holds 250,000 Books
The Litauer Public Administration library today numbers almost 250,000 volumes, and the seminar rooms, each of which holds its own library, add almost 50,000 more. The seminar library on Collective Bargaining is one of the most complete in the world.
In the Littauer basement are the classrooms of the Naval Training School (Radar) which divides its time equally between Litauer and Austin. Also in the basement, and occupying part of the stacks of the library, is all Army Signal Corps group. The Army Civil Training Unit here had its headquarters in Littauer until transference to Widener last week.
Navy Takes Over Reading Room
The entire first floor has been taken over by the Communications School, and on the prosaic wooden doors of Littauer are the legends "Simulated Communications at Sea" and "Night Watch." The main auditorium of the building, which was formerly the main reading room of the library, has a "U. S. Navy Only" sign above the door.
The Graduate School of Public Administration plans to carry on this year, and the second floor social science offices still direct the work of the economics and government teachers, but the services are taking over more and more of Littauer every day, and the Ph.D.'s are far outnumbered by the Ensigns
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