In Cornerstone and Grove, Erik Blackburn Oliver notes: “Seney Hall is the most recognized and celebrated building on the Oxford campus, arguably among the most marvelous edifices ever built by Emory College or the University.” The Victorian landmark was designed by the firm of William H. Parkins and Andrew Bruce, the most prominent practitioners in Atlanta at the time.
A beloved symbol of the college to this day, Seney Hall was built to be the most prominent building on campus, replacing Old Main, which originally served that purpose and had been razed in 1872. Its namesake was a Brooklyn banker, George I. Seney. Seney had been so inspired by a sermon by Emory College president Atticus Haygood, urging sectional and racial reconciliation, that he gifted the school with over $130,000 in 1880. It has stood the test of time and now houses administrative offices.
An aside: Like its neighbor, Johnson Hall, Seney Hall also makes an appearance in the opening sequence of the television show, The Dukes of Hazzard.
Oxford Historic District, National Register of Historic Places
Emory College president Warren Candler, concerned about fire vulnerability on the Oxford campus, began lobbying for the construction of a dedicated library building after a fire consumed the old recitation hall in 1891. At the time, the library was housed on the third floor of Seney Hall and this was cause for concern. A committee was formed in 1897, their efforts culminated in the construction of Candler Hall. The architect, Samuel Manning Patton (1857-1897), who had designed several prominent buildings in Chattanooga, sadly died in a fire in one of them the same year Candler Hall was completed. Clad in Tennessee limestone with a foundation of local gneiss, the Stripped Neoclassical building stands in contrast to other buildings on the quad, with a more “modern” feel. It served as the library until 1970 when it was replaced by the truly modern Hoke O’Kelley Memorial Library across the quad. Candler Hall is now home to Campus Life offices and the college bookstore.
Oxford Historic District, National Register of Historic Places
Now known as Johnson Hall, for Oxford alumnus Judge Horace J. Johnson, Jr., this Romanesque structure was traditionally known as Language Hall and hosted classes engaged in English, Greek, and Latin studies. It was constructed of brick and originally had a texture stucco siding, now replaced with a plain stucco.
According to The Dukes of Hazzard Wiki, the building was also seen on the opening of every episode of the Dukes of Hazzard, beginning with the second episode. It served as the backdrop for the General Lee’s famous jump over Sheriff Roscoe P. Cotrane’s police cruiser as the Duke boys made their getaway. The 16-foot high, 81-foot jump saw the General Lee come to rest near Seney Hall, adjacent to Language Hall.
Oxford Historic District, National Register of Historic Places
Few Hall, thanks to sensitive design, retains its grand Greek Revival appearance, though it’s now attached to a more modern facility and incorporated into the Tarbutton Performing Arts Center. Completed a year after Phi Gamma Hall, in 1852, it was home to the Few Society, named for Emory College’s first president, Ignatius Few. A literary society which grew out of the original Phi Gamma fraternity, the Few Society spent nearly a century engaged in weekly debates and friendly rivalries with their fellow students.
Few Hall originally housed a library on the ground floor and debate hall on the upper floor. Like Phi Gamma Hall, it also saw service in the Civil War, housing a detachment of nurses and doctors from nearby Hood Hospital in Covington.
Oxford Historic District, National Register of Historic Places
According to Erik Blackburn Oliver’s Cornerstone and Grove, Phi Gamma was the first literary and fraternal society at Emory College. Their meeting and debate hall, which anchors the northwest corner of the quad, was completed in 1851 and is the oldest surviving academic structure on the Oxford campus. It has been beautifully restored in recent years and is a textbook example of Greek Revival architecture, to my mind a landmark of the form. It also served as a temporary hospital during the Civil War.
Oxford Historic District, National Register of Historic Places
This historic structure, built in 1905, originally served as the administration building of Young’s Female College. According to Wikipedia, Young’s Female College was established in 1869, and had 15 teachers and 115 students in 1906. It was purchased in 1939 by the Rolt family and repurposed as the Rosemary Inn, a boarding house and hotel catering to the wealthy Northerners who spent their winters in Thomasville. Even with its current use as condominiums, it retains its original appearance.
Dawson Street Residential Historic District, National Register of Historic Places
This landmark on the campus of Andrew College is such an architecturally significant building that I decided to include it here, even if it’s just a few years older than I am. Its origins are in a smaller structure built in 1948, known as the Pitts Library. An expansion of the existing library into the present building was made in 1967 and the Pitts Library moved to another building. This is known as the Suarez Fine Arts Building, named for Annette McDonald Suarez, an Andrew College alumna and Cuthbert native.
Cuthbert Historic District, National Register of Historic Places
While serving as President of the State Teachers and Agricultural College for Negroes, W. M. Hubbard built this Colonial Revival residence for his family. [It’s often referred to simply as the W. M. Hubbard House]. It is still owned by his descendants but at their discretion is not included in the National Register of Historic Places.
Back side of the Women’s Dormitory. This is the side that faces Georgia Highway 83/Martin Luther King, Jr. Drive.
The State Teachers and Agricultural College for Negroes (STAC) was established by William Merida Hubbard (1865-1941) in 1902 as the Forsyth Normal and Industrial School, and was one of three Black colleges added to the University System of Georgia in 1932. The Women’s Dormitory and the Teacher’s Cottage are the only two public buildings associated with the school still extant and have been restored. Besides being home to Monroe County Cooperative Extension offices, the dormitory is also home to the Hubbard Museum and Cultural Center.
W. M. Hubbard was born in Wilkinson County to Edinborough and Betsy Hubbard, who had been enslaved in Virginia until Emancipation. He is likely one of the most important figures in Georgia’s African-American history that you’ve never heard of and I hope more people learn his story. He worked his way through the Ballard Normal School in Macon and then attended Fiske University and Cornell University. While getting his education, he taught in Irwinton, Monroe County, and Jacksonville, Florida. After graduation from Cornell, he spent four years in Cuthbert before finally settling in Forsyth around the turn of the century. Since there was no accredited local Black school at the time, Hubbard worked for a few years as a professional photographer. According to the Hubbard Alumni Association: In 1900 William Merida Hubbard opened a school with seven students in the Kynette Methodist Church in the city of Forsyth. Like many schools in the Jim Crow South, churches presented the only option for educating black children. He opened this school at a time when there was little interest and minimal financial support for African American public education in Georgia. Undaunted by this challenge, William Hubbard cultivated partnerships with the white community in Forsyth. In 1902, Hubbard and five white men from Forsyth successfully petitioned the Superior Court of Monroe County to incorporate the Forsyth Normal and Industrial School with one small building on ten acres of land.
The Normal School added 10th and 11th grades in 1917, receiving full accreditation, and was the first Black vocational school in Georgia. It became a junior college in 1927 but sadly, several buildings were lost to fire soon thereafter. Undaunted, Hubbard oversaw the building of newer facilities, including the dormitory and teacher’s cottage. It became the STAC in 1931. The school merged with Fort Valley State College in 1938 and Mr. Hubbard finished his career there. The following year, the campus became Forsyth’s first Black high school, known as the Hubbard Training Center. William’s son, Samuel Hubbard, oversaw its evolution into the Hubbard Elementary and High School and served as its principal until desegregation in 1970.
It speaks volumes of Hubbard’s legacy that Governor Eugene Talmadge, an avowed racist, praised the man and his accomplishment at his memorial service in 1941.
Vanishing Georgia: Photographs by Brian Brown 