Rome program receives $1 million
Special to The Observer
The University of Notre Dame received a gift of more than $1 million from Frank Montana of Largo, Fla., for the College of Architecture’s Rome Studies program.
“This generous gift gives Notre Dame one more reason to be grateful to Frank Montana,” said University president Father Edward Malloy. “Few members of the Notre Dame family have had so profound, durable and beneficial an impact on our institution.”
Frank Montana, who was chairman of Notre Dame’s architecture department for 22 years, founded its Rome Studies program in 1969 and was its director for several years.
A native of Naro, Italy, Montana studied architecture at New York University and the Graduate Ecole des Beaux Arts in Paris, from which he received a degree in 1939. He taught architecture at Notre Dame from 1939-47, worked for a time in architectural firms in South Bend and Detroit, and returned to the University to chair its architecture department from 1950-72. He directed the Rome Studies program from 1972-75 and again from 1980-86, when he retired from the University.
Campus buildings in whose design Montana was involved include McKenna Hall (1965), the University Club (1968), the Post Office (1967), the old Bookstore (1955), the Center for Social Concerns (built in 1955 as the WNDU television studios) and University Village (1962).
The Rome Studies Program, headquartered on the Via Monterone, has six faculty members and between 45-50 undergraduate students, who stay in Rome from September to May each academic year. During the second semester, 7-10 graduate students join the Rome Studies Program. They live at the Lunetta Hotel in Piazza Paradiso.
The students’ course load is four courses per semester, ranging from design studio, drawing and watercolor classes to architectural theory, and architectural history. The content of their courses emphasizes the school’s focus on classical architecture — the design of contemporary buildings in a classical manner following the precedents of Vitruvius, Palladio and Vignola.
Montana’s gift is a component of the University’s $767 million “Generations” campaign. Announced in 1997, “Generations” is the largest fund-raising campaign in the history of Catholic higher education.
All News Stories for Thursday, August 4, 1999
