CSU Buildings and Grounds History

The Biltmore, 1954

From CSU's Sense of Place:  A Campus History of Colorado's Land-Grant University, by James E. Hansen, Gordon A. Hazard, and Linda M. Meyer.  Fort Collins, CO:  Colorado State University, 2018.

Architect – United States Army

Builder – United States Army Soldiers training under contract at the College

This structure was built in October 1918 as a frost-proof vegetable storage facility for the new military dining hall.  It was 50’ x 21’ x 12’ in size and was designed to have two concrete walls with a four-inch air space to provide the needed insulation for the food being stored.  It had a door leading directly into the Dining Hall kitchen and doors on the east and west side for easy access.  Atop the 12’ concrete walls, a wood-framed building was constructed as a second floor of the structure. It was constructed as a training project by the thirty U.S. Army soldiers being trained in cement work at the College.

Standing just a few feet west of the railroad tracks, the building served the College for forty-two years.  It saw various uses as a storage facility, a dormitory, a clubhouse, a classroom area and even a parking garage in its final weeks. The 1922-23 Directory lists students living in the “Cafeteria Annex”.  A 1925 Sanford Fire Insurance map shows this building as the “Commissary Storage” for the College Cafeteria. In 1940, when the College Cafeteria was razed, this sturdy little building was saved and stood for another twenty years.

In October 1939, the Collegian ran a story about the nine young men occupying this building.  They erected a green and white sign on the building’s east end that said, “The Biltmore”.  The article said it had been used as a barracks and forestry building for some time.  Between 1940 and 1949 campus maps listed the building as the “Forestry Packing House”. The upstairs area housed 26 men for a couple of years following World War II.  The nickname “Biltmore” was used by these residents.

In the fall of 1949, there was an increase in the enrollment in the Department of Home Economics.  From early 1950 until 1957, classrooms and crafts labs occupied the building that was now being called on campus maps “Temporary Home Economics Classroom – Biltmore”.

The 1958 – 1960 campus maps simply called it “Biltmore”. The wooden structure portion of the Biltmore was torn down in the fall of 1960.  The cover of the November–December 1960 issue of The Colorado Aggie Alumnus shows a picture of the partially demolished building.  An article about its history is also included in that same magazine. Its concrete foundation walls were removed on January 24, 1961.  A small parking lot now occupies the site southeast of the Occupational Therapy Building.