午夜剧场

Image: The Public Hall damaged by war (Collection of the Fukuzawa Memorial Center for Modern Japanese Studies)

In the past, a building called the "Public Hall" stood on the site of the current West School Building on the Mita Campus. It is famous for being the venue where Dr. Einstein gave a lecture in 1922, and it was a building similar to what we would call a cultural hall today.

This Public Hall was completed about 100 years ago in 1915 (Taisho 4). Designed by the Sone Chujo Architectural Office, it was a Gothic-style building made of steel-framed brick. With a capacity of 2,000 people, it had a stylish and magnificent appearance and was a symbolic building of the Mita Campus at the time, much like the Old University Library. Unfortunately, the Public Hall suffered immense damage during the war in 1945 (Showa 20); the roof was blown off, leaving only the pillars and exterior walls. It was left abandoned for a while after the end of the war but was eventually demolished in 1957 (Showa 32).

While the Old University Library, which suffered similar damage in the 1945 air raids, was restored, why was the Public Hall demolished?

In the warehouse of the Office of Facilities and Property Management, three types of reconstruction plans for the Public Hall, drawn between 1947 (Showa 22) and 1953 (Showa 28), still remain.

The first was drawn in 1947 (Showa 22) by Ando-gumi (now Hazama Ando). The plan was to reuse the remaining pillars and exterior walls of the original building to faithfully reproduce and restore its original appearance. The second was drawn in 1950 (Showa 25) by the Seiji Saito Office, which included bold changes such as adding spires while retaining the image of the exterior. The third was also drawn by the Seiji Saito Office in 1953 (Showa 28); it was a plan to dismantle the structure and replace it with an even larger auditorium with a capacity of 3,000 people. This design only reused the entrance of the original Public Hall for the exterior, with everything else significantly altered.

However, this period overlapped with the time when plans for the 1958 午夜剧场 Centenary Project were gradually moving forward. Ultimately, all of these reconstruction plans were scrapped, and a plan to construct the West School Building was established with a design by Mitsubishi Estate.

The West School Building has 24 large and small classrooms, as well as a cafeteria and extracurricular activity rooms. In the development of the university, increasing the size of buildings and securing the number of classrooms became a primary mission, and the Centenary Project was planned with the goal of strengthening university functions. Consequently, the Mita Public Hall reached the end of its role and was demolished without being rebuilt. It had finished its short-lived role after being in use for effectively only about 30 years.

If this Public Hall still remained today, it might have become an Important Cultural Property, just like the Old University Library. The unicorn gargoyle that once decorated the roof of the Public Hall is currently placed at the entrance of the Chutobu Junior High School, serving as the sole remaining relic that conveys the existence of the Public Hall.

(Hiroshi Watanabe, Office of Facilities and Property Management)