In my first semester on campus, I encountered a mystery. I saw people walking around campus with Subway sandwiches, but I could not find where they came from. The Subway in Northgate, maybe? It wasn’t that far away, so it made sense.
The first day of my second semester, I had a class in the Music & Dramatic Arts Building. I was walking to the quad when I smelled something familiar. I followed my nose right to a tiny little Subway, nestled in the basement of Foster Hall. There are a million little secrets like this hiding in plain sight on campus. Here are a few:
1. FACES Lab
Television and real life rarely intersect, but there is a place on campus where one of these intersections lies. Nestled in the embrace of the Howe-Russell Geoscience Complex, the Forensic Anthropology and Computer Enhancement Services, or FACES Lab takes the television show “Bones” and brings it into the real world.
Last month, the lab was contacted to identify a skull found in Ascension Parish, with hopes of adding it to the list of 21 solved cases the lab has aided in. The lab also manages the Louisiana Repository of Unidentified and Missing Persons. This database is aimed at matching remains to missing persons on a national level by working with coroners’ offices, local police and national databases. The repository can be viewed at www.identifyla.lsu.edu.
2. Hill Memorial Library
Hidden away from the quad by Middleton Library lies the Hill Memorial Library. The library looks fairly unassuming from the outside, and is a rarely visited building for most University students. Within this building, however, lives many artifacts from all across history. Home of LSU Libraries’ Special Collections, Hill Memorial boasts the largest accumulation of material on Louisiana and the lower Mississippi Valley in existence among its 120,000 book collection. The Louisiana and Lower Mississippi Valley Collections include comprehensive collections of books, periodicals, maps, state documents, microfilm of Louisiana newspapers and historical manuscripts and photographs.
The Special Collections also include several rare books with subjects ranging from books and printing, to religion and history and to literature and art. Notably, the library houses a Second Folio edition of William Shakespeare’s plays, with an epitaph by John Milton. The Special Collections are open to anyone, regardless of University affiliation, but anyone wishing to consult the collections will be subject to a series of procedures and rules to ensure the materials will be available for future use.
3. Magnolia Room
Possibly one of most underrated of the LSU Dining options is the Magnolia Room, tucked into a corner on the third floor of the LSU Student Union. This dining option is a restaurant-style, all-you-care-to-eat lunch buffet. The wait staff covers your drinks and plates, while you partake in the buffet’s options. The restaurant also boasts a beautiful view of the campus. The Magnolia Room is open every weekday from 11 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. and is closed on the weekends.
4. Foster Hall
Along with the aforementioned hidden Subway, Foster Hall contains LSU’s Museum of Natural Science. The museum, founded in 1936, features a 2.5 million specimen research collection, one of the largest and most diverse in the nation. The nine members of the faculty have authored over 100 scholarly publications, making it a great attraction for graduate students.
The museum exhibits nine dioramas made by artist Ambrose Daigre between 1955 and 1964. These dioramas depict various habitats, bringing to life scenes of these habitats. In addition, the museum contains displays on Louisiana’s flora and fauna, as well as the first Mike the Tiger. Admission to the museum is free, and it is open to the public Monday through Friday, 8 a.m. to 4 p.m., closing 2 p.m. on Fridays during the school year.
Murphy J. Foster Hall houses the LSU Museum of Natural History on Jan. 24, 2017.
