It's been a while.

Classes have been kicking my ass -- but I suppose that's to be expected when studying engineering. However, passing through the multitude of passenger tunnels that lie beneath my school and walking past many of the steam tunnel connections that intercept, I finally gave into my desire to explore again.

A friend of mine had made an observation while walking past a campus building that we had shared a class in. Much of the building exterior that was visible to passerby's was inaccessible to the unsuspecting people attending lecture in that very same building.

Doing a little poking through graduate study lounges that seemingly haven't been touched since the pre-pandemic, I found my way into the old exhibit space.



^ The stairs looking into the first floor of the museum.



^ The first floor exhibit space. Left: One of the original backdrops to the exhibits that lined the walls.



^ A since forgotten coyote exhibit. Most of the plaques describing each of the exhibits are still present, but nearly all of the exhibits have since been moved to the new Bell Museum.



^ In the spring of 1971, an expansion to the museum was added to incorporate additional space for the growing collection as well as research in the field of ornithology. Pictured here is a strange courtyard between the original and "new" portions of the building.




^ Two historical photos of the building. The lobby pictured is still accessible, but the stairs in the midground have been walled off. Giving the building a strangely small public-use area compared to what is available on the exterior.

Like I said earlier, I'm a student. I would love to hear any suggestions for how to balance my studies with exploring.

--t

Cool find! Honestly, I definitely had trouble balancing exploring with studying back in college. Mostly I only ended up exploring maybe once or twice a month because I was so busy, though part of that was that there was simply less to explore in Madison than you've got available in the Twin Cities.