Frederickson Fieldhouse was an athletic facility on the campus of Oklahoma City University built in honor of a major OCU benefactor, George Frederickson of Oklahoma City. In his gift to OCU, Frederickson stipulated that the building should be built by his nephew, John Henry Frederickson. Accordingly, it was built by the John Henry Frederickson Jr. Construction Company, also of Oklahoma City, with John Henry Frederickson was the
general contractor. John Henry Frederickson's son Chris Frederickson also worked on the job as a laborer. Frederickson Field House was a facility. At the time of its construction in 1959 it the largest
hyperbolic paraboloid structure in the world. The Frederickson company was a pioneer in the design and building of extremely thin-shell
concrete buildings, of which Frederickson Field House was one. Another famous thin-shell concrete structure built by John Henry Frederickson was the First Christian Church in Oklahoma City, a building has an "eggshell"-shaped roof that is actually thinner in proportion than a real
eggshell. Frederickson Field House held 3,400 for basketball. Asked why the scoreboard at the Field House was the first one to have a three-digit capability for game scores, Abe Lemons, the head coach at the time, said "Come to the first game and you will find out." Teams rarely scored in the 100s at the time (the late 1950s), but in the first game at Frederickson Field House OCU beat
Florida State, scoring 129 points in the game. The Chiefs went on to become one of the highest-scoring teams in the
United States, scoring over 100 points a game on many occasions. Frederickson Field House was replaced with the more modern
Henry J. Freede Wellness and Activities Center — named for
Henry J. Freede — in 2000, and was torn down in 2005. ==References==