For photos of the Gault Center Gala
For more photos of Gault Center dedication event
On Tuesday morning, Tom Gault sat in the shadow of the building once known as the Old Gym, almost directly under the second-floor office window where, as a college student, he had made his makeshift dormitory room 70 years earlier.
A few feet away, facing a large crowd of alumni, trustees, benefactors, faculty, staff, students and interested townsfolk, Martin Methodist College President Ted Brown was telling how a little gymnasium built in 1931 that had been out of commission for two decades had been given a second life.
“Jonathon Swift once said that ‘you can’t make a silk purse out of sow’s ear,’” Brown said before slowly looked over his shoulder at the breathtaking $3.2 million transformation that is now the Virginia and Dr. Thomas Gault Fine Arts Center.
“Well, I just have to say it: Jonathon Swift didn’t have a design-build team like the one we have at Martin Methodist College.”
Indeed, just 11 months earlier a ceremony had been held on this very site to begin the renovation. At the time, the dank, dark structure with windows either broken or boarded up gave onlookers little clue of what was in store; little did they know how the campus’s ugly duckling would evolve into an architectural swan.
And Dr. Thomas Gault was back for this remarkable reveal, a smile on his face and memories no doubt racing through his mind.
“This building is part and parcel with Tom Gault’s Martin experience,” Brown said. “In fact, if you check out that second window from the right upstairs, you may see a nose print still on the glass from young Tom checking out a young lady walking down the sidewalk . . .Virginia Garner from Decherd, Tennessee.”
Brown went on to tell the story of young Tom Gault, who arrived on campus in the fall of 1938, in the first group of men admitted as students. He had come from nearby Cornersville to run the dairy operation that the college had purchased a few weeks earlier from his uncle; in return for his labor he received tuition, room and board. At the start of his second year, he found an empty room on the second floor of the gym and fashioned it into his dorm room.
He would go on to marry Virginia Garner and remain in higher education, eventually becoming Dr. Thomas Gault, a respected scholar in geography and chairman of a nationally known academic program at Indiana University of Pennsylvania.
Through it all, Brown said, Tom Gault never forgot where it all started, and following Virginia’s death in 1997 he began thinking about establishing a scholarship in her memory at their alma mater. Then, a few years later, he learned of the ambitious project to turn his beloved Old Gym into a fine arts facility; he decided he would make a major gift that would name the building in Virginia’s memory and the lobby in honor of his new wife, Ruth, whom he said had given him “a second life.”
“Suffice it to say that no one better represents the vision for Martin Methodist College than Dr. Tom Gault, who maximized his potential and, once a success, never thought twice about giving back,” Brown said. “This is the quintessential Martin story, and it seems so perfect to have it permanently represented in the center of the campus in this tangible way.”
The morning dedication, which concluded with tours of the new facility, was followed on Tuesday evening with a black-tie gala for donors to the project. The 126-seat recital hall was the setting for several brief performances, including music faculty member Mark Hagewood on the new nine-foot Steinway grand piano. Meanwhile, art students demonstrated the many features of the classrooms on the second floor, and guests toured the Barbara and Michael Barton Art Gallery, also located on the second floor.
The Gault Center also is home to 11 of Martin Methodist College’s 12 new Steinway and Sons pianos – earning the college the distinction of being the 96th “All-Steinway School” in the world. In addition to the nine-foot grand in the recital hall, a Steinway is located in the choir rehearsal room, three music faculty offices and five individual practice rooms. The 12th Steinway – a seven-foot grand – is on the Martin Hall Auditorium stage.
Members of the community also toured the Gault Center on Wednesday evening when Martin Methodist College hosted a Giles County Chamber of Commerce “Business After Hours” reception.
The weeklong dedication will conclude on Thursday evening with an invitation-only Steinway Concert, featuring pianist Marilyn Shields-Wiltsie of Nashville.
