Main Building (MAI)

The Main Building at the University of Texas at Austin is identifiable by its three hundred and seven-foot tower, which rises from the center of the campus like a massive limestone exclamation point. Completed in nineteen thirty-seven, the building was designed by architect Paul Philippe Cret to house the university's central library. Inside, a unique system once functioned where librarians on roller skates navigated the twenty-seven floors of book stacks, sending volumes down to students on the lower floors via an eighteen-story dumbwaiter.