Campus Landmarks
Ashley Schiff Memorial Park Preserve
Dr. Ashley Schiff was a dedicated and popular professor of Political Science and avowed naturalist in the early days of Stony Brook University. In 1970, a 26-acre woodland, lined with oak and maple trees, often walked by Professor Schiff and his students, was set aside to honor him.
Fauna spotted in the area include garter snakes, Virginia opossums,rabbits, chipmunks, and box turtles. The preserve is located between Roth Quad and the Marine Science Research Center.
Boulders
Scattered about the Stony Brook campus are several hundred granite boulders, 20,000 year-old leftovers from the Ice Age glaciers that once blanketed Long Island. During the extensive excavations that accompanied the initial construction of buildings and roadways on campus, these boulders were unearthed and incorporated into the landscape. Today, many of these ancient rocks serve as brightly painted totems for fraternities, sororities, and other campus organizations. (Word to the wise: Don't go tagging rocks just because you're feeling inspired; permission from the Office of Student Activities is strictly required!)
Paul Simons Memorial Bike Path
Stony Brook’s campus is set among 1,100 wooded acres, complete with a nature preserve. The Paul Simons Memorial Bike Path, six miles of pristine pavement for biking, running, and rollerblading, encircles the campus.
The path is dedicated to the memory of Paul Simons, a former Stony Brook student and avid cyclist. The path will ultimately connect to the proposed Town of Brookhaven trail.
Red Dragon Labyrinth
The seven-tier labyrinth, located by Mendelsohn Quad near the woods northeast of Stony Brook Union, was dedicated to the campus in 2004 and designed to help users achieve balance and perspective as they walk the 54 feet of interwoven circles. The labyrinth was sponsored by the United University Professions, the Protestant Campus Ministry, Radiation Protection Services, and University Hospital’s Department of Nuclear Medicine. Each year, the Department of Campus Recreation offers classes in meditative walking.
Signage
Only at Stony Brook is routine campus signage created by perhaps the most celebrated figure in graphic design — and the result is anything but routine. The bold, witty, eye-catching signs adjacent to the Administration Building, Student Activities Center, Melville Library, and other prominent campus buildings, were conceived and designed by Milton Glaser, perhaps the only commercial designer whose name is a brand in its own right. Glaser also created the University logo.
Stony Bones
It's a long way from Cretaceous-era Madagascar to present-day Long Island —8,600 miles and 70 million years, to be precise — but Manjungasaurus crenatissimus looks right at home in the lobby of our Administration Building. The exact replica of the Cretaceous meat-eater is patched together from specimens unearthed on Madagascar by a team of Stony Brook University paleontologists, led by Dr. David Krause of the Department of Anatomical Sciences. The fearsome skeleton has even acquired a nickname: "Stony Bones."
Zebra Path
The Zebra Path is a striped geometric walkway connecting the Academic Mall with northern sections of campus beyond John S. Toll Drive. The eye-catching path lies in front of the Career Center and behind the Melville Library. In March 1981, as part of an advanced seminar in public art, Stony Brook student Kim Hardiman won a grant to beautify the campus. Her 232x12-foot handpainted walkway, regularly refurbished with new coats of paint, constitutes one student's lasting tribute to the Stony Brook campus.
9/11 Memorial
The Memorial Arch, located in front of the new Humanities Building, was donated by the Stony Brook Alumni Association in memory of the 21 Stony Brook alumni who were lost on September 11, 2001. Designed by Milton Glaser in collaboration with Nicholas Fasciano, the twelve-foot-high by eight-foot-wide arch is constructed of brass that will gracefully age to a soft verdigris. Engraved down each side of the arch are the names of those who were lost:
Joanne Ahladiotis, Jean A. Andrucki, Michael A. Bane, Carlton W. Bartels, William F. Burke Jr., Michel P. Colbert, Stephen M. Fogel, Steven E. Furman, Richard S. Gabrielle, Kuifai (Raymond) Kwok, Edward J. Mardovich, Rudy Mastrocinque, Michael P. McDonnell, Manika Narula, Christopher M. Panatier, John W. Perry, Lisa J. Raines, Jonathan S. Ryan, Margaret M. (Walier) Seeliger, Peter A. Siracuse, and Walwyn W. Stuart Jr.