AUB between the two wars: A transformed University, not a College anymore!

"At this time, there were three specially important problems to solve. The first of these was to develop the old College Hospital, so that it could take the place of the Prussian Hospital, which had been occupied by the French army. In order to do this, some physical expansion was needed. First, a building for the servants and a garage were constructed. Then a pupil nurses' home, labo­ratory building, and third floor to the Eye Pavilion were added. The nursing service was expanded and the X-ray modernized as much as possible."

 Dodge, B. (1958). The American University of Beirut: A brief history of the university and the lands which it serves. Beirut: Khayat's. p:56

"The second problem was to purchase more land. So much money was required for obtaining this land, that it held back the development of the University for many years. Before the war it had never occurred to anyone that the College should own the land between the campus and the sea. But after the war it became evident that the University must procure the land, before it was purchased for the erection of apartment houses and hotels. In 1925, part of the newly acquired land was turned into the large athletic field. When the boulevard along the water front was built, the tunnel and bathing facilities were added, during the summer of 1930. It was also at this time that the field back of the Hospital was purchased."

Dodge, B. (1958). The American University of Beirut: A brief history of the university and the lands which it serves. Beirut: Khayat's. p:57.

General Weygand, chief in Syria, Gabriel Puaux, High Commissioner of the French Republic and Emile Edde, President of the Lebanese Republic, October 1940

Photographer, M. Saade

American University of Beirut, Archives and Special Collections, Jafet Library

"The third problem was to adjust the University to the newly established French and British mandates. The position of an Am­erican institution in Lebanon when the French mandate was estab­lished, was like that of a Spanish school in the Philippines, when the Americans occupied the islands."

Dodge, B. (1958). The American University of Beirut: A brief history of the university and the lands which it serves. Beirut: Khayat's. p:57