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From Left to Right: 1)Your room! 2)Jazz in the Lounge! 3)Hall Council! 4)Weekly Tea Parties!

Opened in fall 1961, Samuel Plantz Hall housed 167 men in 65 double rooms and 37 singles. It replaced three aging frame buildings that had been used as dormitories and was built on the site of the Hamar Union and the Sigma Phi Epsilon House. Most residents took their meals in their respective fraternity houses; those men not affiliated with fraternities ate their meals in Brokaw Hall.

The promotional literature was very proud of the fact that public areas were kept to a minimum; the main floor lounge was only twenty-six by seventeen feet. Economy of space carried over to the residents’ rooms. The average single room was nine by sixteen feet, while the doubles were twelve by sixteen feet, with built in furniture.

Marguerite Schumann ‘44, Director of Publicity and Publications for the University in 1961 described the interior: “If Paul Gaugin had been an Appleton housepainter instead of a French painter-at-an-easel, one might suspect that he had a hand in the interior of Samuel Plantz Hall… For the newly completed… dormitory displays a spectrum of hot, tropical colors that recall Gaugin’s impressions of the South Seas where he spent his artistic life. There is a mating of orange, raspberry and blue that is as exotic as the pattern on a sarong or the feathering of a cockatoo.”

At a cost of $755,000, Plantz Hall was financed through a loan to the federal housing and home finance agency. Construction began on June 1, 1960 and the first male students moved in October 1961. A last minute crisis occurred when new beds, ordered fourteen months earlier, had not arrived a week before move in day. The story goes that someone spotted the truck bearing 167 beds sitting across the street from the police station just forty-eight hours before new student arrival.

Today Plantz Hall is home to 171 male and female students.

Student Staff

The fabulous Plantz RLAs work hard to create a positive and vibrant community where our students can establish great friendships and feel at home.

Click here to find out more!

Professional Staff

Each residence hall is staffed with a Residence Hall Director whose responsibility is to oversee the operation of the hall and all programs connected with a specific hall.

Click here to find out more about the current RHD's!

Hall Council!

Hall Council is a representative group of students, with elected officers open to all residents of a community.  They strive to support the mission of residence life, take action to improve the quality of life and foster community ownership and pride.  Hall Council hears the concerns of residents and works to address those concerns by utilizing community resources to plan activities and purchase items, promote community respect and accountability, and establish clear and consistent communication among appropriate members of the Lawrence community.  As a result Hall Council empowers residents to stay informed about and invested in the development of their community and serves as a leadership opportunity for students.

In past years we have made Hall T-shirts, eaten gallons of ice cream at Baskin Robbins or Coldstone Lock-Ins, kept nourished with Finals Food, releived stress by Lazer Tag, practiced our coordination with All-Hall Bowling, purchased DVDs for the Hall, played fifty hours of TRIVA straight and much, much more! To get involved, please contact you current Residence Hall Director or Residence Life Advisor!