L. L. Loar Memorial Music Building, West Virginia Wesleyan College

Introduction

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Built in 1953, the L.L. Loar Memorial Music Building has classrooms, offices, an auditorium, and practice rooms. It is the center of Music Education on campus.

Images

Ethel Ray Loar 1906. After just one semester, she had to leave school due to Rheumatoid Arthritis. She lived until 1930 at home with her parents caring for her.

The front of this building faces Meade Street.

Backstory and Context

Text-to-speech Audio

Ethel Ray Loar, a student at the college in 1906. After just one semester, she had to leave school due to Rheumatoid Arthritis.

Her father, Lawson Leolidas Loar, was a successful businessman in Clarksburg. He also was the Superintendent of Sunday School at the Methodist Church in Grafton at the time of the first Mother’s Day Celebration. He died in 1938, and Ethel's mother agreed in 1943 to provide funds ($100,000) for the Hall of Music as a memorial to the Loar Family. The building was not finished until 1953. This was a true act of devotion and hope for the future to have provided the funds at the beginning of World War II.

There are classrooms, practice rooms, facuty offices, an auditorium, and the Loar Memorial Lounge in this building.

Sources

Haught, Thomas W. West Virginia Wesleyan College First Fifty Years 1890-1940. Buckhannon, West Virginia. West Virginia Wesleyan College Press, 1940.

Miller, Brett T.. Our Home Among the Hills, West Virginia Wesleyan College's First 125 Years. Buckhannon, WV. West Virginia Wesleyan College, 2016.

Plummer, Kenneth M. A History of West Virginia Wesleyan College 1890-1965. Buckhannon, West Virginia. West Virginia Wesleyan College Press, 1965.