Box, Hal

John Harold (Hal) Box was born August 18, 1929, in Commerce, Texas. Hal Box received his early training in architecture at The University of Texas at Austin, where he graduated at the age of 20 with a five year Architecture Degree, and as an apprentice to architect O'Neil Ford. His career began in aircraft structural design during his service in the U.S. Navy Civil Engineer Corps, and was followed by his tenure as Project Architect for Broad and Nelson Architects of Dallas, Texas. In 1958, Box formed the architectural and design practice of Pratt, Box and Henderson Architects in Dallas, Texas, in which he remained active for the next 27 years. His work there included The State Fair of Texas Master Plan, Brookhaven College, and University Facilities for the University of California at Santa Barbara, University of Oregon, Colorado State, and The University of New Mexico.

Box was the first Dean of the School of Architecture and Environmental Design at The University of Texas at Arlington, a program he created in 1971 and remained with until 1976. In 1976, he was chosen as Dean of Architecture at The University of Texas at Austin, a program he led for 16 years. Box began research in 1988 to study and document the 16th century open air churches of Mexico under the auspices of Earthwatch with additional funding from the Graham Foundation, the University Research Institute and the University of Texas Institute for Latin American Studies. Each summer through 1994 he has led a group of volunteers (assisted by Logan Wagner) to Mexico to undertake archival research, photographic documentation, and the preparation of measured drawings of open air churches and other civic spaces in the states of Morelos, Mexico, Michoacan and Hidalgo.

After serving as Dean, Box was W.L. Moody Centennial Professor of Architecture, a position he held until his 1998 retirement. Over the years, Hal Box won several design competitions, national, state and local design awards; and numerous professional honors. He was inducted into the College of Fellows, American Institute of Architecture in 1971. In 1994, Professor Box was presented an ACSA Distinguished Professor Award in Montreal, Canada, and he was given the prestigious Llewellyn W. Pitts Award by the Texas Society of Architects in 1998. The Hal Box Endowed Chair in Urbanism was established at UT-Austin in 1999. The Texas Exes alumni association bestowed its highest honor, the Distinguished Alumnus Award, on Box in 2003. He is active in architectural research, photography, and documentation of communal open spaces of the 16th century New Towns in Mesoamerica. Box is the author of The Prairie's Yield, Designs for Dallas, and The Architecture of Ricardo Legorreta.