For most Kansans, the name Erasmus T. Carr probably doesn’t have
a familiar ring. But talk about the buildings he constructed and
his place in state history becomes evident: Anderson Hall at
Kansas State University in Manhattan; the Kansas State Capitol
Building in Topeka, and the Kansas State Penitentiary, which
later became the Lansing Correctional Facility. He was born in
Greenville, N.Y., on Oct. 28, 1824. He started out as a
bricklayer, mason and carpenter and, in time, became an
architect. He moved to Kansas in 1855. He had been offered the
position of superintendent of buildings at Fort Leavenworth,
constructing the Arsenal and Ordnance Depot. He then opened an
architectural office in Leavenworth and began work on designing
the state penitentiary building in 1863. In 1876, Carr designed
the Kansas exhibit building for the Centennial Exposition in
Philadelphia. His work on Anderson Hall at K-State was done in
pieces, according to the building’s application form for the
National Register of Historic Plac