W. Lorenzo Skidmore

Jon Alfred, Barn Team historian, writes the following about USU Barn architect W. L. Skidmore:

In my quest to find out more about W.L. Skidmore, I have discovered that he is NOT related to Skidmore Construction of Idaho Falls, as we had earlier speculated. I spent time with Richard "Dick" Skidmore, who founded the Idaho Falls company more that 50 years ago. He directed me to his brother Bill "William" Skidmore who lives in Brigham City. Bill is a genealogist and knew that his grandfather William Lobark Skidmore had a son named William Lorenzo "Lonnie" Skidmore in his old age. William Lobark Skidmore had two wives and 18 children. Bar architect Lonnie is the half brother of Dick and Bill's dad. Unfortunately, Bill indicated that he doesn't know much about that side of the family; however, he did offer two tidbits:

1. Jay (?) Skidmore was a Sociology professor here on the USU campus and was Lonnie’s son. Jay's wife Hannah Jean, though likely remarried, may still be in the region.

2. Bill said he would learn more about that side of the family and get in contact with me if he found anything intriguing.

Dick did mention that there was a Skidmore architectural firm in L.A. and Bill mentioned one in Chicago. More leads. I will follow up and let you all know what I find.

Man's Best Friend

Landscape Architecture graduate student and Barn research team member Emily Wheeler notes the following based on her work in Special Collections:

On the south end of the Art Barn, above the original barn door and between the impressions of two horseshoes, is the phrase “Man’s Best Friend” (see photo, taken in summer 2008). This inscription dates back to the building’s use as the campus horse barn. In the 1943 yearbook the inscription is explained as being a cavalry motto, but it doesn’t seem that any cavalry regiment used this expression as a motto. Members of the cavalry, however, did sometimes use the phrase “man’s best friend” to describe horses. An article titled "Why Modern Armies Still Cling to the Cavalry,” in the November 1932 issue of Modern Mechanix and Inventions, states that the cavalry felt that "man's best friend, the horse" would always have a place in war. When the horse barn was built in 1919, most people probably thought that the horse would always have a place on campus, and some of the barn’s designers seem to have agreed that the horse, not the dog, was man’s best friend. At this point, however, the origin of the phrase at it appears on the barn is a mystery. If you know more about this, please leave us a comment!

Details about the "New" 1919 Barn

The following post comes from USU Landscape Architecture graduate student and Barn research team member Emily Wheeler:

"I've been digging through old newspapers and have found out a little more about the destruction of the original horse barn and the building of our Barn. The old barn did not burn down, but some USU students in editorials suggested burning it down if the administration did not remove it. The article I read initially was one of those editorials, written like an actual article. Apparently the barn and its removal was a bit controversial. Even then it was historic, one of the oldest buildings on campus, and it was considered a "model" barn. However, as the campus grew around the barn, it became a nuisance due to the smells, sounds, and sights associated with it. It was finally removed in May 1919.

"On October 10th 1919 the new barn--our Barn--was completed. It was built by Alston & Hoggan of Salt Lake City for about $6,000. It was designed, Alston & Hoggan said, by members of the animal husbandry department with help from a local architect (that would have been W.L. Skidmore, as posted previously). The Barn was designed to fit 11 horses, with 6 individual stalls and 4 box stalls. It had (and still has!) a cement floor, running water, grain bins, a hay and straw chute, harness room, office, and hay loft with hardwood floors. It was considered very modern and attractive. An article I consulted from the period suggested that the hay loft would be a great place to hold a barn dance, but I don't know yet if that ever happened."

So, we wonder, does anyone out there remember the Horse Barn loft having been used for dances or other informal events?

Photo of Guy Cardon & U-Dandy

In the last posting, I shared Alice Cardon Crockett's wonderful story of the horse U-Dandy, who hailed from the Horse Barn. Alice found and shared a picture of her dad, Guy Cardon, who owned Logan's Bluebird Restaurant at the time, with U-Dandy. Guy Cardon stood 6'2" tall, so you can see that U-Dandy was a big horse (but not at all mean!).

The Story of U-Dandy

Alice Cardon Crockett, now of Idaho Falls (and in the photo, looking at a portrait of herself and her mom Joyce Cardon, ca. 1950), sent us the following story she wrote about the Barn, which was to her a "magical place." She knew the barn in the 1950's, when she and her family lived on the brow of the college hill. Alice's dad, Guy Cardon, owned the Bluebird Restaurant, and her best friends were Stephen Merrill (Dr. Milt Merrill's son) and Susan Campbell. She reports that they knew the Barns, Old Main, and the Art Building (when it was by Old Main) like the backs of their hands, much to the dismay of the adults in their lives! Here, in her own wonderful words, is Alice's story of a favorite horse, U-Dandy:


I've loved horses for as long as I can remember. At first, stick horses, smooth barked and silent, were my steeds. They raced like the wind when I rode them, and walked only on the uphill or through bramble bushes. My home was built two blocks from an agricultural college. That same home place is now directly across the street from a thriving university.

The Barns with their paddocks, stalls, corrals, sheds and huge hay barn housed sheep, cows, pigs, turkeys, goats and horses, and was an integral part of the college. My friends, Susan and Stephen, and I made daily trips to the Barns, by foot or bike, in the summer. Horses lived in the side stalls and corrals of the big hay barn. A center isle inside the barn was sided with barred open windows and padlocked stall doors. A wood staircase angled to the hay loft above. We would spend hours in the loft leaping into loose hay, listening for mice, gazing over the campus, never concerning ourselves with upright pitchforks or thirty foot falls.

U-Dandy, one of the Barns' resident horses, was a handsome sorrel with a white blaze and a long line of very official ancestry. I carried freshly picked alfalfa to U-Dandy each morning. He would come out of his stall into his corral when I called him. My dream was to gain his absolute trust and love, then talk my mother and father into letting me bring him home. I never thought in terms of money, just devotion.

One morning, after U-Dandy had finished his alfalfa, I climbed the dimly lit loft stairs and gathered an armful of sweet smelling hay. On my decent I could hear mice scurrying by the grain bins. I asked Susan and Stephen to talk to U-Dandy while I climbed his corral fence to place the hay in his stall. As I was heaping hay into his bin, I noticed the daylight darken at the doorway. U-Dandy was walking in and his stall became instantly very small. I was terrified by the size of him. I reached up and touched his muzzle and uttered the only word I could think of. "Back," I whispered. To my amazement he backed out of the doorway. I slipped past him and scrambled up the corral fence. Susan and Stephen sat motionless, eyes huge with wonder--"friend gets trampled and squashed in horse stall" was written all over their faces.

"I'm going to ride him," I told them. "As soon as he comes out, I'll call him over here and I'll climb onto his back. I'll hold onto his mane...and we'll walk around." My friends said it sounded possible and agreed to watch.

U-Dandy strolled from his stall into the sunny corral. He shone like a new copper penny. I called him over to where I was perched on the top rail. He came. Holding the fence with my left arm, I leaned out, stretching my right leg over his broad back. I eased my balance to the center of his backbone, let go of the fence and latched onto his mane. Except for my pounding heart, all was silent. Then we heard it--the truck of the Barns keeper. The same Barns keeper who had told us not to herd the cows, not to chase the turkeys, not to play in the loft, and not to feed hay to the horses.

As I sat on my faithful steed, the Barns keeper slowed his truck. His stern face told me I should dismount, maybe even run. Susan and Stephen jumped to the bottom rail just as I caught the top rail. U-Dandy spun on a dime and galloped to the far corral corner, then faced me. "That's a stud horse," growled the Barns keeper as he walked towards us. "He bites and he's mean. I don't want you anywhere near him. He'll bite your fingers off. Git home, the three of ya." We did, lickety split.

Until the college horse barn became the university Art Barn, I faithfully brought alfalfa to U-Dandy who did not bite and was never mean. And in my university years, I came to the Art Barn to throw clay pots--just kitty-corner from the stall where U-Dandy had munched hay years ago.

Interview Excerpt, Michael Butkus, '68 & '76

After graduating from USU in 1968 with a zoology major, Michael Butkus enlisted in the Army, eventually receiving training as a combat engineer officer and military intelligence officer. He earned a master's degree from USU in outdoor recreation in 1976, began working at USU in 1988, and currently serves as an academic advisor in the College of Natural Resources. He recalls the following about spending time in the mid-1960s in the Art Barn, where he posed as a model for art classes:

"The Vietnam War was going on hot and heavy; it was getting even worse and Utah State was not above its little influences as far as demonstrations with the activists around. But as I thought back about it, the Art Barn sort of sat in the middle of everything; it seemed like kind of a refuge from some of the other stuff that was going on. By the student center there would be demonstrations and people would be marching around and so forth, but it just seemed like the Art Barn itself, just based on its nature on what went on in there, was kind of a refuge from all that, and I sort of got that sense when I went in to do my posing.

"It was pretty quiet, and people were focused on the art aspect of what we were doing, and there weren’t other influences that would be evident at that particular time. I always thought it was kind of cool that we had sort of a neat little facility right there in the middle of campus, particularly in this time of our history when it was pretty intense and all the stress going on with different people and people had chances to relieve that stress. I think maybe that was something that the Art Barn could give."

Clio Club presentation, Feb. 17, 2010

Barn Team historian Jon Alfred presents his Barn-related findings at a Clio Club meeting, February 17, 2010.