The History of McGill University's Buildings

Description

The Ernest Rutherford Physics Building, named after one of McGill's most famous radiation physicists, was constructed in 1977 to provide this department with more modern labs and equipment than could be housed in the Macdonald Physics Building. This five-storey structure, built by Dobush, Stewart, Hein, Longpré, Marchand, and Goudreau, stands on University, across the way from the Eaton Electronics Laboratory (recently demolished) and the Foster Radiation and Cyclotron Building. Dobush and Stewart were two of the architects commissioned for McLennan Library and Stewart Biology and so were already familiar with the style of the campus. The Rutherford Building consists of prefabricated concrete slabs attached to a steel frame. Special precautions were taken to make the building as tremor free and stable as possible due to the nature of the experiments carried out here. The concrete is of a texture and colour that blends with the rest of the McGill campus structures. The only element of decoration in this functional building is the regular fenestration of tinted grey panels. The ground floor contains offices and large lecture rooms while the the upper storeys are given to offices and labs, some quite specialized. On the roof there are two astronomic observation domes used to study the stars on clear nights. Recently, the Ernest Rutherford Museum, which contains his desk and some of his equipment, was removed from the Macdonald-Stewart Library and was installed in the Ernest Rutherford Physics Building where it is still appreciated by modern physicists.