"Skate with a Knight" promotion, enjoying the opportunity to skate with Golden Knight hockey
players.
In the spring of 1985, impressed by a survey which revealed strong student interest in
the construction of a new student center, the administration began to study the feasibility of a
center. By 1987, the students overwhelmingly approved a $25 yearly increase in the student
activity fee for the next 20 years to help finance such a center. Impressed when student leaders
Joelle Mulich and Ted Ferreira reported that action at the New York City meeting, the Trustees
included the student center in the University's fund-raising campaign then being planned.
Construction of this 110,000-square foot center was begun early in June 1990 and was
completed in time for the arrival of students at the beginning of the fall semester in August
1991. Contracted by alumni-owned companies such as Murnane Associates, Shelly Electric,
Atlantic Testing Laboratories, Armani Plumbing and Mechanical, and Cives Steel Company,
the job of erecting this building was not delayed at any time by inclement weather or labor
disputes.
Some interesting construction trivia about the Cheel Center:
• 100 North Country workers
• 11,000-sq. ft. tile
• 4,500 cubic yards of concrete
• 40 miles of wire
• 600+ tons structural steel
• 3,168 student mailboxes
• 339,000 sq. ft. concrete block
• 300 new parking spaces
• 600+ light fixtures
Special Postage Cancellation.
A special postage cancellation was designed by the University
and the US Postal Service to commemorate the dedication of the Cheel Center. This
cancellation was available at the Lamar Post Office in the Cheel Center only on October 19. It
depicted the Clarkson seal and a circle to the right giving the date. Made by a unique rubber
stamp, this cancellation was valid for only four hours, after which the rubber stamp was
destroyed by Post Office officials.
As part of the dedication and to add to the special nature of the event, the Post Office
Department agreed to place on sale in the Cheel Post Office a new US postal issue for the first
time-a green and gold Olympic stamp portraying a hand holding an Olympic torch, similar to
the NCAA torch.
New Arena.
Accustomed to old bench-style seats, no color, and bad lighting, fans in Clarkson's
new hockey arena in the Cheel Campus Center found a new atmosphere: considerably better
lighting, more comfortable seats, and an interior color of a bright shade of blue. Another
significant change was in the ice itself. Resembling the National Hockey League's Boston
Garden, another old building with a relatively small ice surface, Walker Arena's had an ice
surface of 194 feet by 80 feet six inches, making it smaller than the majority of the other
hockey arenas in the league.
The new Cheel Arena's ice surface covered 200 feet by 85 feet, including an extra three
feet behind each net which allowed a lot more mobility and action around the nets. Other
changes were made in the protective glass, boards, team boxes, seating capacity, and
scoreboard. The new sideboards are higher: Walker's sideboards were three feet high; Cheel's
are up to five feet high. Cheel's protective glass extends higher than Walker's, and is made of
regular tempered glass, making it easier to see through, instead of the easily scratched and
