• Journal of architectural history
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• v.21 no.4
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• pp.47-58
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• 2012

The purpose of this paper is to trace the architectural origin of the Bosung College Library (1935~37), which is currently used as Graduate School Building of Korea University. So far, numerous books have repeatedly described that the library was modelled on a Duke University library, but without any serious consideration. Through literature review, field-trip and archives investigation, this research discovered new critical facts concerning the origin of the building. First, Dong-Jin Park, the architect for Bosung College, saw a photograph of the Duke library in a Duke University catalog possessed by Chun Suk Auh, Professor of the college at that time. Second, the Duke library that he saw in the catalog, which might possibly be Bulletin of Duke University (Feb. 1931), is certainly the present Perkins Library (1930) in Duke University West Campus. Third, the architect probably referred not only to the library but also to other Duke buildings such as School of Medicine and The Union, of which photographs were also published impressively in the Bulletin. Although the Bosung College Library was inspired by the Duke buildings, however, it is undoubtedly a creative design work by the architect Park. Arguably, these findings broaden our view of Korean architectural history in the modernization period, and it is more than a confirmation of just one building's origin.