IDENTIFYING ARCHITECTURE BY USE

The first question history people ask when they see some place different? “What happened?”

Then they start investigating the architecture, interviewing and researching and writing what they think happened.

Sometimes they get it more right than others.

What’s the first question history museum people ask when they see the same thing?

In the spirit of history, what is going on in the architecture in the top pic?

It’s made of cement and about three stories high.

Is it a school? Maybe a dorm? This is a dorm, my first dorm.

It’s made of cement, too. Always check for material sources. If it’s metal, is it ferrous metal, magnetic?

The part about cement gives a modern clue, but Romans used cement too.

What goes into cement, just for added analysis? Glad you asked.

Measured by the cubic yard.

With all sorts of rock inside.

This is the recipe:

If it was a dorm, this would be the front door?

And the back door?

Give up yet? Here are a few hints.

It isn’t the ruins of an English castle.

It’s not downtown Detroit.

Not an abandoned subway station.

Think of industrial uses, something to build huge structures, architecture that lasts and lasts and lasts so long it’ll never go away.