Marlen McKinney, daughter of the late benefactor for the McKinney Fountain, said Thursday the family wasn't told IU was going to remove most of the fountain.
“I think it’s a gorgeous fountain,” she said. “I’d be shocked that they’re going to tear it down.”
The Frank E. McKinney Jr. Fountain, located on Eagleson Avenue across from the Jacobs School of Music, started operation in 1997 and was dedicated to McKinney, a prominent banker and businessman.
About $700,000 in donations funded the creation of the molded concrete fountain, according to a Herald-Times article from 1997 when it was built.
Just three years after it was built, there were already problems with cracks in the steps and leaks. It has since been shut down and repaired numerous times.
Tom Kernan, associate dean for the Jacobs School of Music, told WFIU/WTIU News on Wednesday that given how much it would take to repair the fountain, the time for the “demolition” of the fountain had come.
Most of the fountain had been removed by Thursday. Only a structure known as the “conductor element” remained.
IU spokesman Mark Bode said Jacobs School of Music faculty and staff were notified during a town hall in April. He said “additional stakeholder outreach” occurred last fall.
Kernan said Wednesday the space is being reimagined with more outdoor seating.
“We were starting to see annually a lot of cracks and need for repair in the physical face of the fountain itself,” Kernan said.
“Every spring there had become a ritual of trying to patch it up as best as possible. So it was really beloved, but it was past its lifetime. And so, looking at not being able to keep it as is, the item that we knew we really needed outside was some additional seating, so that people could enjoy the beautiful outdoor aspect of campus. And that seemed like a really prime location for it,” Kernan said.
Bode said in an email statement that the fountain being torn down and replaced with outdoor seating is “an incorrect characterization.”
Bode said the structure will maintain its conductor element as it’s being cleaned and restored. He said the “structure will retain its overall shape” with more seating added. Tiered seating will function as an informal choral performance space and there will be more shrubs, plants and lights.
Bode, however, could not provide a rendering of what the space will look like.
“These changes are being made to prevent costly annual repairs and allow this structure to continue to serve as a public art and gathering place for the Jacobs School and the campus more broadly,” he said.
Some Indiana University faculty members criticized the university’s decision to take down McKinney Fountain and rework the space, citing a lack of transparency.
In a Facebook post, Steve Sanders, professor of law within IU’s Maurer School of Law, called the move a “disastrous decision,” saying it “will be a scar on the beauty of campus.”
In an interview with WFIU/WTIU News, Deborah Cohn, Provost Professor in IU’s Department of Spanish and Portuguese, said she, along with other faculty members, were unaware the project existed.
Kyle Adams, director of undergraduate studies in the Jacobs School of Music, declined an interview, saying he didn’t know how the project came to be or who was responsible for it.
Cohn said she is sad and frustrated about the decision given the fountain’s history and relevance to campus. She doesn’t think the space is a good spot to put more outdoor seating.
“I think that particular spot is on a busy roadway, and it's very much in the sun, and I don't think that's necessarily going to attract a lot of people,” she said.
Jeffrey Isaac, James H. Rudy Professor in IU’s department of political science, declined an interview, but said in an emailed statement the development is misguided.
“Under Pamela Whitten, the university continues to make all kinds of decisions—about who is fit to be Dean, about how faculty will be subjected to new review procedures, and whether faculty will be disciplined or fired on the basis of the flimsiest of student complaints of ‘bias’ — in seemingly arbitrary and unaccountable ways,” Isaac said. “The tearing down of the McKinney Fountain is one more such decision.”
