David R. Hermansen Papers Collection

This collection contains office files of David R. Hermansen concerning Hermansen’s career as an architectural educator and advocate of historic preservation, covering the period ca. 1957-1990. It fills four record storage boxes, five document cases, and two other small boxes (7.2 cubic feet). Although Hermansen was widely known for his work promoting the preservation of Indiana county courthouses, his courthouse research is not included in this collection.

Lecture notes for history of architecture courses constitute the bulk of the collection. 17 loose-leaf volumes of meticulously prepared notes (in 4 record storage boxes, catalog number 33-1) are arranged geographically (by continent) and then by historical period. Additional volumes hold notes for a televised course on the history of city planning (33-2) and notes on naval architecture (33-3).

Syllabi prepared by Hermansen for various history of architecture courses (33-4) list and give basic facts about the works to be studied in that course. Duplicated and given or sold to students, the syllabi served as study guides. The first in the series is for a course in “History of Renaissance and Baroque Architecture” at the University of Kansas, 1964. When Hermansen came to Ball State, he structured the history of architecture courses along typological lines (“history of housing", “history of city planning,” etc.) rather than the typical chronological arrangement. This is reflected in eight later syllabi for courses (or combinations of courses) at Ball State.

A 1959 syllabus on “modern architecture” by Turpin C. Bannister (33-5) evidently served as a model for those written by Hermansen. Hermansen studied under Bannister, a noted architectural historian, at the University of Illinois.

Other records concerning Hermansen’s teaching and professional practice are contained in 88 folders (33-6 through 33-86, in three document cases). Included are correspondence, reports, handwritten notes, draft HABS architectural descriptions and National Register of Historic Places inventory-nomination forms, photographs and photo negatives of buildings taken for a series of downtown revitalization workshops, press releases and newspaper clippings concerning the workshops, photographs of drawings produced during the workshops, and claims for reimbursement of expenses. The original arrangement of these records—geographically by county, in alphabetical order by county name—has been retained, except for eight folders (33-6 through 33-13) that pertain to topics broader than a single county.

Hermansen’s geographical files originally contained additional information about historic buildings and historic preservation activities in Indiana. He was an active collector of clippings, promotional leaflets for tourist sites and house museums, events calendars, maps, locally published books and pamphlets, historic structure reports, some student papers documenting historic properties, and similar materials. About 400 such items (1.2 linear feet) were transferred to the Documentation Collection (DOC-) for ease of access. A set of pasteboard dividers that Hermansen made for his geographical files, one divider for each county, with labels neatly printed in his hand, have been reused for their original purpose in the DOC-collection file cabinets.

Three additional boxes contain photographic negatives, prints, contact sheets, and slides that had been stored in the office of the College of Architecture and Planning staff photographer (catalog nos. 33-87 through 33-97). Included are images of Hermansen's Indiana County Courthouse research, city revitalization studies, student projects, Indiana round barns, preservation events, and Hermansen's retirement party. Some of the photos are by the Ball State University Public Information Service. Authorship of the other photos is uncertain. Evidently, some of the negatives were taken by Hermansen, others by College of Architecture and Planning staff photographers. Similarly for the slides, Hermansen may have taken the slides of the Emily Kimbrough House before and during restoration (catalog no. 33-96). College staff photographers probably took the slides of student work done in Hermansen’s classes (33-97).