Building 20 at MIT: The Magic Incubator

In John Lehrer's article in The New Yorker criticizing brainstorming, he also told a fascinating story about building 20 at MIT.

Building 20 was constructed during the Second World War, and initially served as the home of the Radiation Laboratory. It will be torn down in 1998 to make way for a new complex of buildings to house MIT activities in computer, information, and intelligence systems, to be named after Ray and Maria Stata.
In its 55 years, Building 20 has housed many MIT activities. It was never intended to last this long. "The building was constructed in...1943 as a war building and is of a temporary nature," reads an architect's memo, "...the life of said building to be for the duration of the war and six months thereafter."
Its "temporary nature" permitted its occupants to abuse it in ways that would not be tolerated in a permanent building. If you wanted to run a wire from one lab to another, you didn't ask anybody's permission -- you just got out a screwdriver and poked a hole through the wall. Of course this was in the days before the dangers of asbestos were recognized.
This building cast a spell over those who worked in it. Many former occupants have noted the magical power of the building to bring out the best from those in it, and the very real feeling that this was a special, even a unique, place. At the same time it served as a breeding ground, or incubator, of many research areas, of the minds of its students, and of new organizations. Many MIT laboratories and centers had their origins in Building 20, or else were formed by people who had spent years there.


http://www.eecs.mit.edu/building/20/anecdotes/index.html