Carol Rose Kahn
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Dear U of M folks working on Hill Auditorium history:
Bless you for polishing a  gem  and  making it whole again.  Hill auditorium was designed by my grandfather, Albert, whom I never knew. My father,  Edgar "Eddie" Kahn, passed along many stories about his life and adventures .  In 1978 , while studying at U of M, I recorded an oral history of my father, who recounted this story:

Father had been given the problem of designing an auditorium that would seat five thousand people, where they could hear from every seat.  The only known previous example was the Mormon Temple.  It was said that you could hear a pin drop from the stage to the top balcony.  On the other hand, the acoustics are not so good in the Mormon Temple because there’s so much reverberation there.  Well, Father knew very little about acoustics.  The fact is that nobody knew much about scientific acoustics. 

There was only one man in the country who really was eminent at that time, Hugh Tallant.  Father wrote Mr. Tallant and asked him if it was possible to build an auditorium for five thousand people, where they'd hear from every seat. Tallant said,"I will think it over and let you know."  He wrote back a few months later, saying "I think it can be done."  So Tallant designed the acoustics.  Hill Auditorium was built in the shape of a megaphone.  Singers loved to sing there because it was just like singing throught a megaphone, really. 

Hill Auditorium was nearly finished when I was fourteen or so.  My father and I went out to Ann Arbor.  Father stood up in the last seat of the second balcony, and I went down on the stage. On my word of honor, I dropped a pin and he heard it.

Carol Rose Kahn