The Pink Palace

by John Fopeano

1965 was the first time anybody used the name "Health Related Professions" officially at UB. The location for our medical technology program knocked around for some time.

Our first place was in some laboratory space that the biochem department had. When they turned that into small laboratories, the pharmacology department gave us some space. All this time, occupational therapy and physical therapy were in houses over on Winspear. Each one had a house, and that was it.

We picked up some laboratory space in the basement of the hospital, but then we had to get out of that. They moved us to Ridge Lea, and we spent two years there. So we have knocked around. During that time, they built what we called "The Pink Palace" behind ECMC. That was to be a five-year temporary building.

We moved into the Pink Palace about '72 - and med tech just moved out of it about two years ago. That was the first time we ever had any place to call home. It's still there and has been remodeled, and apparently it's nicer than it was before.

I remember that I had a chance to sit down with the man who was in charge of the facilities planning for the Pink Palace. It was a Friday afternoon, and before the weekend was over, we had to tell them what furniture we wanted: the laboratory tables, the benchwork, everything.

The layout of nine thousand square feet had to be planned before we went home on Friday night. So we were there with the furniture salesman and his catalogues. We'd just say, "I want one of those and one of those. Make this layout look like the layout in the bacteriology lab." We got this electronics lab that was unique. I'd never seen one like it before, and it worked out well. Its fixtures were all islands, and the tables were all movable so you could put them into any configuration.