Institute History

This page documents the Institute's history as reflected in historical materials housed in the Wentworth University Archives. This information is not an extensive history of the Institute, but a starting point for research. Compiling the Institute's history is an ongoing project, therefore, information may be incomplete. The materials used in compiling this information have been cited at the bottom of each page. For access to, or more information about archival material, please contact the archivist.

Included on this page is information about the following topics as they pertain to the Institute between 1903-1923:

• Campus Building and Expansion
• Notable People (content to be added)
• Military Involvement (content to be added)
• Sports (content to be added)
• Student Activities and Extracurriculars (content to be added)

Ward 22 

The Sewall & Day Cordage Company made rope for clipper ships. The company had operated in the Roxbury area since 1834. Their operations were powered by the Stony Brook, until city development cut off access to the tidal basin. Due to this development, the company was eager to sell the property. On November 17, 1908, the Sewall & Day Cordage Company sold the 13-acre plot of land to Wentworth Institute. 

The purchase expanded Wentworth’s land ownership to a 359,000 square foot lot between Huntington, Ruggles, Parker, and Ward Streets. This was in addition to the already purchased 140,000 square foot Huntington Street lot across from the Museum of Fine Arts. This second, smaller lot was a pit often filled with water runoff and used as an outdoor skating rink. Later, it would become the baseball field and Huntington Development (2025). Both plots in total cost the Institute $446,500.

Power Plant 

The Power Plant was the first building constructed on Wentworth's campus. Completed in 1910, the Power Plant was the first of four buildings architects Peabody & Stearns designed for the Institute. Between Williston Hall and the Power Plant, the Institute spent $250,000 on construction.  

Not only did the Power Plant power the Institute, it provided an active learning environment for evening students enrolled in the Steam Engine and Power Practice (S. & E.P.P.P.) program. Students studied the operation and testing of state-of-the-art steam and gas engines, boilers, electric generators, and motors. During World War I, the Power Plant housed one of eight military training courses. This particular course was designed to train soldiers on gasoline engines. The other courses included instruction on wooden structures, bridges, timbering, concrete construction, structural drafting, and generation of power. Wentworth would go on to train 4,077 men for war service. 

In 1975, one of the first co-op assignments for Wentworth students included tending to the Power Plant boiler. 

In January 1990, Wentworth installed a 600kW cogeneration unit at the Power Plant. The new unit ran on natural gas. Later in the decade, in 1996, a flood left six feet of water in the Power Plant. Campus lost all electrical services for a week.

Williston Hall 

Other Name(s): West Building, Shop Building 

Williston Hall, built under the name West Building, was the second building to be erected on campus. Designed by Peabody & Stearns, construction on the 38,000-square foot building began in 1910. Literal horsepower supplied the resources that constructed West Building. Between Williston Hall and the Power Plant, the Institute spent $250,000 on construction. The five-story building was completed before classes began in September 1911, and was home to the Institute’s foundry, carpenter shop, pattern shop, machine shop, blacksmith shop, plumbing shop, and electric wiring room. West Building also housed the Institute’s administrative offices and became the Institute’s first academic building. When classes began in 1911, tuition cost six dollars a semester. 

In 1917, West Building was home to the firing range. After 1926, the varsity Rifle Team used a tunnel underneath the Strengths and Materials Lab for practice. The firing range was later moved to the attic, to what was then the PET lab. Subsequently, the firing range was moved to Dobbs Hall in 1957. 

In the 1950s, the roof level of West Building housed the track for the Model Railroad Club.  

In the 1960s, the Missile Laboratory, the Drafting Section, and the Air Force Contracts Offices were located on the third floor of West Building. In the summer of 1961, a machine shop addition was added on the third floor of the West Building to “provide additional machine shop capacity for our expanding enrollment.” The Institute spent more than $50,000 on new machinery, including 12 lathes, 6 or 7 milling machines, 4 drill presses, and other tools for 25 workstations. 

In 1967, West Building, or the Shop Building, was later named after Wentworth’s first principal, Arthur L. Williston. During construction, Principal Williston was adamant that the architecture of the building reflect how he intended to govern the student body, which was that of a “large manufacturing plant.” He envisioned a building where students could be observed by administration in order to keep watch of habitual tardiness. 

By Spring 1974, the Welding Shop on the ground floor of Williston Hall held the following demonstrations: automatic welding, gas tungsten arc welding, gas metal arc welding and sheet metal arc welding. In the Foundry, students poured molten metal into molds. 

In 1978, twenty-four students from various disciplines joined the new Woodworking Club, under the direction of Mr. William McCaffrey of the Building Construction faculty. The first major project was building grandfather clocks made of cherry wood, which took “approximately 200 hours to complete.” The pattern shop on the second floor of Williston Hall was open 20 hours per week, as well as some Saturdays. 

In 1995, Williston Hall was the site of interactive leadership workshops. For 50 years, the 3rd floor of Williston Hall housed the Institute's project lab for Air Force contracts. The lab's name was later changed to Wentworth Laboratories. The lab was closed in 1997. 

Late in the Fall 2000 semester, the Student Services suite opened on the main floor of Williston Hall.  In the early 2000s, Williston Hall was connected on the upper levels with Dobbs Hall and Wentworth Hall, reviving it as a central area of academic life at the Institute. 

Wentworth Hall 

Other Name(s): Main Campus Building 

Wentworth Hall, originally known as the Main Campus Building, was completed in 1914. The middle building of the Academic Complex, Wentworth Hall connected Williston and Dobbs Halls. Architects Peabody & Stearns purposefully designed Wentworth Hall, and the Complex as a whole, to encourage students to enter and exit only through the main doors. This was done in part so Principal Williston could observe student tardiness, since entering the building though the main doors forced all students to walk past the administrative offices and announcement bulletin boards.  

The use of Wentworth Hall has changed over the years. Formerly, the building also housed applied physics laboratories, mechanical drawing rooms, a motor laboratory, and a refrigeration laboratory. The top floor was used as the Institute's first dormitory. In the 1930s, the electrical installation and maintenance laboratory was in the basement. 

The steps of the Main Campus Building were used for class photos. During wartime training, ceremonies were held on the steps. Later, students used the steps for smoke breaks between classes. 

In the winter of 1966, the first official meeting of the Wentworth Ski Club was held in the Wentworth Hall. 

The school’s unofficial library lived on the second floor of the Main Building until Beatty Hall was completed in 1967. Wentworth's Physical Plant employees moved the books into the new library by hanging a wire between the Main Building and Beatty Hall to ferry the books across the quad. 

The area surrounding Wentworth Hall has been used for a variety of events. Bob Lazarus (PET '61) was the only student in Wentworth history nearly kicked out of school for hitting a home run. During a baseball game on Wentworth's home field, Lazarus hit a home run that crashed through a first-story window in the back of the Main Building--President Beatty’s office. Football used to be played in the field behind the Main Building. In the fall of 1933, a call went out for football recruits, and more than 15% of the student body (78 men) participated. In 1965, the residents of Wentworth Hall, then being used as the campus’s first dorm, defeated the residents of the Park Drive Apartments in a series of tug-of-war contests. 

Dobbs Hall 

Other name(s): Commons Building, East Building 

Dobbs Hall was completed in 1916. Designed by architects Peabody and Stearns, the building was designed to be a mirror image of Williston Hall. Dobbs Hall housed the drafting rooms, labs and shops for industrial electronics, a strength of materials lab, shops for carpentry and building construction, and the printing program. The print shop operated on the top floor of Dobbs in the 1920s. 

Dobbs Hall was converted into barracks to house and train army recruits while the Institute operated as a military training school during World War I. During the “reconversion” period of postwar 1945, the second floor of the East Building welcomed a new electronics laboratory, which featured 24 work benches, procured courtesy of postwar surplus programs. For a time, after 1957, Dobbs Hall housed the school's Rifle Team.  

In 1967, Dobbs Hall was renamed after Wentworth Institute's second principal, Frederick E. Dobbs. 

Dobbs Hall, along with Wentworth, regained its prominence as a center of academic life in 2000, when the Institute renovated the facilities, building connectors on the upper levels. Today, Dobbs Hall currently houses administrative offices, academic classrooms, and strength of materials classrooms. 

One-Year Day Courses 

1. Machine Work 

2. Pattern-Making 

3. Foundry Work/Practice 

4. Carpentry and Building 

5. Electric-Wiring 

6. Plumbing 

Two-Year Day Courses 

1. Machine Construction and Tool Design 

2. Electrical Construction and Operation 

Evening Shop Courses 

1. Carpentry and Building 

2. Pattern-Making 

3. Machine Work 

4. Plumbing 

5. Tool-Making 

6. Foundry Practice 

7. Electric-Wiring 

Evening Technical Courses 

1. Practical Mathematics 

2. Mechanical Drawing 

3. Machine Design 

4. Practical Mechanics 

5. Strength and Properties of Materials 

6. The Steam Engine and the Operation of Power Plants 

7. Applied Electricity 

8. Electrical Machinery