Community Hall was the first building constructed on the Oregon State University campus in Corvallis, Oregon and the oldest structure on its campus today. Its original name was simply the Administration Building while the university itself was using the name under which it first organized, Oregon State Agricultural College. It is situated on a gentle slope called "College Hill" just west of the city's commercial center on the west bank of the Willamette River, and there anchors the rest of the school's remaining original buildings on the "Lower Campus" : Apperson Hall, Benton Annex, Education Hall and Gladys Valley Gymnastics Center.
History
1860 saw a lien placed on the first building to occupy the site, by a carpenter who had not been paid for his work. The ensuing sheriff's sale resulted in ownership of the building, the land and the school operating there by Rev. Orceneth Fisher on behalf of the Methodist Episcopal Church South, to which he was pastor. By 1885, calls from local leaders were growing loud to convert it to a state institution which would be eligible for Federal funds under the Land Grant program and the church agreed to relinquish control. In response, the Oregon State Legislature passed an act that reorganized the school as the state's agricultural college, but skeptical of the actual awarding of Land-grant status decided to require the citizens of Benton County to bear the full costs for the construction of a suitable building to house its offices, which the act stated could be no less than $25,000 though if successful the building would become property of the state upon completion. The 1880 census had reported only ~1,400 households within the entire county, but less than two years later the sum had been raised, permits secured and construction began on the Administration Building still standing largely unchanged today as Community Hall. ”The building's cornerstone was laid by the Ancient Free and Accepted Masons of Oregon on August 17, 1887. It opened in September 1889. On Oct. 28, 1987, Governor Neil Goldschmidt signed a proclamation declaring the day as "Benton Hall Day". Benton Hall was renamed Community Hall in November 2017.
