The English Office Building, one of the oldest structures on campus, will soon be but a memory contained within photographs and aging archived stories.

At the June 19 Board of Regents meeting, the board approved the demolition of the English Office Building after more than a century of use. The building is located between Carver Hall and Beardshear Hall.

In 1884, the English Office Building was built at a cost of $3,117.10. According to university archives, the building was originally used for offices of the university president, secretary and treasurer.

Through the years, the building has served as home to the college bookstore, the music department, the English department and international education services. Currently, the building is used to house business school faculty, according to university archives.

Dean Morton, university architect, said the demolition has been planned since the 1960s.

“The 1964 master plan showed an open space there,” he said.

The plans call for leaving the area between Carver and Beardshear hall as green space, without a building, Morton said.

“Carver was built way too close,” he said. “We pay a lot of attention to spacing [on campus].”

The closeness of Carver Hall to the English Office Building indicates there was always an intention of demolishing it, he said.

The building is only marginally up to fire safety codes, Morton said.

“It’s not meant for the kind of occupancy we’re using it for,” he said.

Kerry Dixon-Fox, university project manager, said the timing of the demolition has not yet been finalized.

“Right now [the demolition] is scheduled for spring semester after [the faculty vacate their offices],” she said. “Until they specifically identify when the faculty would vacate, we can’t move forward with the plans.”

Morton said it has taken so long to tear down the building because it is always in use.

“It is hard to tear it down when somebody’s in it,” he said.

In terms of the final end of the building, Dixon-Fox said there will be as much architectural salvage as possible. She said there are numerous salvaging companies that will bid on the project.

“[They will] strip things for resale — some of the wood trim, some of the doors,” she said. “Architectural salvage houses have anything and everything in them [available for sale].”

People looking to restore houses and other buildings will be the likely buyers for salvaged material like that from the English Office Building, Dixon-Fox said.

Neither Morton nor Dixon-Fox knew what would be the design of the green space to take the place of the demolished building.

“We haven’t even started the planning yet,” Dixon-Fox said.

“The design of the space has not been done,” Morton added.

However, the recently dedicated George Washington Carver statue, near the English Office Building, will not be demolished, Morton said.

The statue will probably remain where it is, Morton said, or it could be moved someplace else on campus, but it certainly won’t be demolished with the building.