Blanton House
If walls could talk at Blanton House Eastern faculty and staff membersWilliam Berge, Fred Engle, Charles Hay, Chuck Hill, James Street, DougWhitlock and A.L. Whitt shared some memories with us: Blanton House reflects the Italianate and Queen Anne styles popular in the 1880’s and was one of a group of gracious houses termed “Faculty Row.” Today, it is the only survivingVictorian residence on Lancaster Avenue. In Depression and post-war years, Eastern presidents often “put up” students stranded by problems with local bus and train systems. In the spring of 1955 a tornado ripped off the roof of young Roy Kidd’s student housing unit.The future football legend found emergency housing with President O’Donnell and enjoyed the produce of a lush Blanton House vegetable garden. Generations of faculty and staff children were photographed in their Easter Sunday finery against the garden gate and flower beds behind Blanton House. During a shortage of men’s dorms in the late 1950’s, President O’Donnell asked faculty members to board students. Leading by example, he hosted Tom Marshall, a diminutive biology student widely known as Molecule. One night Molecule was summoned to the house’s only telephone, located at the president’s bedside. “Don’t ever do that again,” he told his caller, mortified to have disturbed his august landlord in pajamas. WhenVice President Lyndon Baines Johnson gave Eastern’s commencement address in June 1961, he visited Blanton House as a guest of President Martin. In the mid 1970’s, Dr. and Mrs. Martin had new carpeting installed throughout the first floor. During a yearbook photo shoot, a floodlight was accidentally set face down on the carpet, burning a baseball-size hole. Student yearbook advisor Doug Whitlock witnessed the incident and reports that the Martins’ calm handling of the situation “moved my admiration for them up a few notches.” When Blanton House was redecorated for J.C. Powell’s tenancy, Dr.Whitlock, then executive assistant to the president, arrived just in time to stop a painter whose faulty work order directed that the solid walnut grand staircase be painted pink.“J.C. thanked me for that many times,” Dr.Whitlock remembers. The copper roof was painted black in 1985 because of protests that it looked “too fancy” for Richmond. When an electrical malfunction kept all lights on for four days and nights, President Glasser slept blindfolded until the problem was resolved. Work by local artists adorns Blanton House, including paintings by Pat Banks, glass pieces by Eastern staff member Stacey Street and silk flower arrangements by Ann Kelly Smith, also on the Eastern staff. When the February 2009 ice storm left both his children without power in their homes, PresidentWhitlock reports,“there were a couple of nights that the Blanton House sheltered son, daughter, three grandchildren and four granddogs. It was full and alive.” If you have other Blanton House stories to share, please write Jackie Collier, director of alumni relations, at jackie.collier@eku. edu, or at Richards Alumni House, Eastern Kentucky University, 521 Lancaster Avenue, Richmond, KY 40475.
18 Eastern
PresidentWhitlock says goodbye to the first lady before making the short stroll to his office next door in the Coates Building.