The magic of KU’s fountains

BBN Architects, with offices in Kansas City and Manhattan, proudly claims the Kansas City, Missouri, Parks & Recreation Department as one of its oldest clients, so principal architect Lorie Doolittle-Bowman has, over the course of her career, enjoyed numerous opportunities to design iconic features of the City of Fountains.

“My first project with this firm,” says Doolittle-Bowman, a’80, “was the Garment District Fountain in downtown Kansas City. And then I went on to do the Children’s Fountain, and the Rose Garden Fountain at Loose Park, and the Kemper Fountain, at 10th and Main. And I just went on and on from there.”

Designing the privately funded reconstruction of KU’s Chi Omega Fountain is particularly meaningful because Doolittle-Bowman was a Chi-O who fell asleep in the sorority’s old sleeping dorm to the sounds of water splashing and students cavorting.

What is it about fountains that grants their magic charms, whether in a busy roundabout, a big-city park or even a home garden?

“Gosh, I don’t really know, exactly,” she says. “I guess it would be the sparkle and the sound. And with this fountain, it’s the placement. It’s just such a great gateway piece for the end of Jayhawk Boulevard. I think it’s really wonderful.”

Doolittle-Bowman met with sorority members during summer planning stages, and they took news of the fountain’s temporary absence hard: “They were so upset. They didn’t realize this was coming, and they were just beside themselves.”

Hoping to dampen the loss of the campus landmark for the next school year, project planners installed safety elements to cover rebar exposed by the removal of the fountain’s center structure. That means the fountain’s eight jets will continue spouting sparkly aquatic arcs until contractors arrive to raze the site.

Mourn not, however: Built in 1955, the Chi Omega Fountain is finally getting the TLC it needs and deserves.

Not so fortunate is the Alumni Place Fountain, near the limestone retaining wall behind the chancellor’s residence. It once was a charmer, with a sky-blue pool and benches and just the right touch of serenity to make it a haven for students, faculty, staff and visitors who frequented the east side of campus.

The cast-stone fountain, built in 1953 at the urging of Chancellor Franklin D. Murphy, c’36, was purchased with $1,300 in private funds from the Erkins Studio in New York City. After three decades of deterioration, an exact replica was ordered from Erkins and installed in 1981; vandals broke its top bowl in 2017, and the fountain has never been right since. It is now dry and lifeless, with concrete chunks littering a defeated pool.

University Architect Mark Reiske, a’86, says another replacement has proved difficult to source, and the setting within the historic housing area limits options. A new bowl and fountain, with new plumbing and electrical, could be installed “quickly and for not much money,” he says, but a replica is needed, and, while Student Senate and KU Housing “are open to ideas and donations,” the fountain is “not going to get repaired anytime soon.”

So, yes, the Chi Omega Fountain will be missed this school year, and construction work in the middle of a busy roundabout will be a pain, but it’s all good. And one day next spring, it will once again be great.