Hall Auditorium

Hall Auditorium is a building on the campus of Miami University in Oxford, Ohio.Construction and planningThe building that is currently referred to as Hall Auditorium was built in 1907–08 on Miami University's campus, and was known as the Administration Building or the Auditorium. It was officially named "Benton Hall" in 1926 after Miami's twelfth president, Guy Potter Benton. In the 60s, there was a plan to demolish the building because they were going to expand Miami University King Library, so the Benton name was moved to the behavioral sciences building that had recently been built. In 1969, they found out that they did not need to raze the building, and thus renamed it Hall Auditorium for Miami's fifth president, John W. Hall.Benton Hall was the principal assembly hall until 1932 when Withrow Court became the location of the major convocations and performing arts programs. The construction of the new administrative building (Roudebush Hall) was completed in 1956, and the Music Department moved to ‘Benton Hall.’ Benton Hall contained the auditorium and University administrative offices. The offices of the president, dean, and business manager were on the second floor, the registrar, YMCA and The Miami Student has offices on the main floor. It was used for graduation and commencement purposes and ‘total Miami meetings.’ Since 1956, the building has contained the music department including the Performing Arts Series Office and the Philosophy Department.RenovationsThe building was renovated from 1991 to 1993. It was a five and a half million dollar project that gutted the entire building, and only left one interior support wall, the floor on the ground level, and the woodwork and wood flooring in the lobby. Contractors removed the south end in order to double the size of the stage to improve the acoustics and sight. This reduced the capacity from 1,200 to 735, which is the amount it still seats today. This is Miami's second largest auditorium, only smaller than Millett Hall. The designers added new lighting and state of the art sound systems. They decided to renovate because, according to Holly Wissing, Miami's spokesperson in 1993, the hall had become old and the acoustics needed to be improved. There was a grand opening performance by the Echternach Festival Orchestra.