Gearing Hall

200 W 24th St, Austin, TX 78705

North of the Main Building, the Home Economics Building, now Mary E. Gearing Hall, is the gateway to and anchor for what was originally known as the "Women's Campus." This segment considers the architectural history and design of this part of campus as a point of contrast for other areas of campus to be explored throughout the tour.

Info: A School for Women

Mary Etna Gearing, undated, Dolph Briscoe Center for American History

Although UT was coeducational from its founding in 1883, (white) women’s education differed from that of men. The women’s campus included a focus on domestic education, in the form of the “Home Economics” School and building, as were the norms and expectations of the times. Opened in 1933, the University renamed the building in 1976 after Mary E Gearing. She was the founder of the School of Domestic Economy, later named Home Economics, and today the School of Human Ecology. She was also the first woman to hold the ranks of professor and department chairman at the University of Texas.

The building served as the gateway to and anchor for the “Women’s campus” as designed by early architects Herbert Greene and Paul Cret. Its interior, vestiges of which still remain, was suggestive of a domestic environment paying tribute to women’s roles in Texas history.

Early photographs of women’s life on campus captured below convey the gendered education of women, revolving around the home.

Home Economics Tea Room, UT Austin, undated, Dolph Briscoe Center for American History

Food preparation, Home Economics’ Tea Room, UT Austin, undated, Dolph Briscoe Center for American History

Women’s study hall, Old Main, circa 1910-1919, Dolph Briscoe Center for American History

Women athletes holding sports equipment, circa 1920/30s, Dolph Briscoe Center for American History

The full undergraduate integration of the University in 1964, diversified the campus racially and by gender. By fall of 2018, the student body was 52.7% women and 47.3% men.[1]

[1] “Facts & Figures,” The University of Texas at Austin, accessed February 22, 2019 https://www.utexas.edu/about/facts-and-figures

Bibliography

For more on Gearing Hall see:

Kwallek, Nancy and Denise M. Patton. “The Campus Beauty.” The Alcalde 77, no. 6 (July/August 1989): 16–18.

For more on women’s mobilization at UT and in Austin see:

Griess, Rachel. “Fight Like a Girl: How Women’s Activism Shapes History,” Life & Letters College of Liberal Arts Magazine, July 3, 2018, http://lifeandletters.la.utexas.edu/2018/07/fight-like-a-girl-how-womens-activism-shapes-history-2/

Images appearing in 360 video:

“Paul Philippe Cret,” University of Pennsylvania Archives & Records Center, 1910. https://archives.upenn.edu/exhibits/penn-people/biography/paul-philippe-cret

PPC: Gearing, Mary Edna, di_06020, The Dolph Briscoe Center for American History, The University of Texas at Austin.

Transcript

We’re standing on the southern steps of Gearing Hall.
What academic program has its home in this building? The president of the University of Texas at Austin brought Mary Edna Gearing to campus in 1912 to start the School of Domestic Economy, later the School of Home Economics. She became the first woman to hold the ranks of professor and department chairman at the University of Texas.
The campus architect, Paul Cret, who designed a large number of buildings on campus, including the main building, designed this building which opened in 1932 specifically to house the home economics program. It was named after Gearing in 1976. In the 1930s, Gearing Hall joined the women’s residence halls, Littlefield, Carothers and Blanton, and the women’s gym, Anna Hiss, as the main academic building and focal point of what was known as The Women’s Campus. Notice how the building stands in the middle of what might have been a mall, leading north from the main building, which is directly to the south of us. And please notice its architectural shape and remember that both buildings were designed by the same architect.

Changing...

Effect:

1. Littlefield Mansion
2. Women's Campus
3. Gearing Hall
4. Painter Hall
5. Steps of West Mall
6. South Mall
7. South Plaza Architecture
8. Jefferson Davis and George Washington Statues
9. Albert Sidney Johnston Statue
10. Robert E. Lee Statue
11. Right Side of Littlefield Fountain
12. Neo-Confederate University
13. PCL and Alumni Center
14. Campus Confederate Flags
15. Texas Cowboy Pavilion
16. Simkins and Creekside Residence Halls
17. Robert Lee Moore and Jim Bob Moffett Buildings
18. Conclusion

Next Stop

4. Painter Hall

1933 architectural planning map of the University of Texas rendered by Paul Philippe Cret, with the location of the Painter Hall tour stop marked.