This article needs additional citations for verification .(March 2024) |
Old Germantown Academy and Headmasters' Houses | |
Location | Schoolhouse Lane and Greene Street, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania |
---|---|
Coordinates | 40°1′58″N75°10′27″W / 40.03278°N 75.17417°W |
Area | 9.9 acres (4.0 ha) |
Built | 1760 |
Architectural style | Colonial/ Colonial Revival |
NRHP reference No. | 72001168 [1] |
Added to NRHP | January 13, 1972 |
The Old Germantown Academy and Headmasters' Houses or The Old Campus is an historic, American school campus, the original site of Germantown Academy, located at Schoolhouse Lane and Greene Street in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. The academy moved to a new suburban location in 1965, and the site is currently occupied by the Pennsylvania School for the Deaf.
The site was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1972.
After the founding of Germantown Academy in 1759, the land for the campus was donated by Dr. Charles Bensell, a prominent Germantown landowner and later trustee of Germantown Academy.
The first structure erected on campus was the old schoolhouse with belfry. It was built using local Wissahickon schist and was designed in the colonial style. Until the school's 1965 relocation, this school held the distinction of being the oldest school still operating out of its original building. The schoolhouse was replicated on the 1965 campus in Fort Washington. [2]
The bell that hung in the belfry was first ordered in 1770 and brought over from England on the tea ship Polly. Due to the tensions with the British crown in the early 1770s, however, the ship was unable to land; as a result, the bell was transported to Chester, Pennsylvania, where it remained until it could be moved to Germantown.
Seven years later, during the Battle of Germantown, the Germantown Academy was used as a hospital and camp for the occupying British army. Recorded stories indicate that troops used the belfry and its weathervane for target practice before and after the battle. During the same occupation, the first game of cricket played in the United States was reportedly played on the academy lawns.
Today, the original weathervane, complete with a British crown (no longer in use), still shows bullet damage.
Between its start in 1759 until 1888, the campus changed very little, even as the school grew in number and in prominence. At the insistence of alumni, a gymnasium was donated for student use. The building was known as Alumni Hall and was later converted into the school chapel after the building of a new gymnasium in 1950. The building was built closest to the corner of Schoolhouse Lane and Greene Street and was designed in the colonial revival style of architecture.
At the turn of the century, academy leaders proposed that a rear addition be made to the 1760 schoolhouse. That addition became known as Sauer Hall, and was named after Christopher Sauer, one of the founders of the academy and the publisher of the first German bible in America.
In 1920, academy leaders purchased the adjoining property on Schoolhouse Lane, looking toward Wayne Avenue, that was known as the Alburger property and later as the Dove House and Kershaw Hall. The Alburger residence had been built during the 1760s as a house for one of the early masters of the academy. Over time, it was used by different families and changed from its colonial origins into a building with distinct Victorian architectural traits.
The house briefly hosted George Washington in 1793, during his stay in Germantown at the time of the Yellow Fever epidemic in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania and while it was the home of the academy's German master, the Rev. Frederick Herman. Washington and some of his former generals were treated to meals and reportedly used the house for cabinet meetings during the epidemic.
The house was bought by the academy in 1920 and was restored to its original colonial style in 1937. Originally two stories, a third story was built during its occupation by families. During the renovation, the third story was removed. In 1937, the house received an addition (in the same colonial style) which was used for kindergarten classrooms.
The next addition to campus came in 1932 after the death of alumnus Edward Wynne Moore, who had been a member of the class of 1903. Moore Hall was constructed and served as a space for the intermediate grades. The building was erected in the rear of Dove House.
The last building to be built before the school's move to Fort Washington was the gymnasium that was erected to the right of the Dove House, looking toward Wayne Avenue. The gym was built between 1950 and 1951 in honor of recent academy members who were veterans of the World Wars.
Located in the rear of the 9-acre (3.6 ha) property was an athletic field that served as a football and baseball field and a track, depending on the season. Due to the lack of space, many teams including the soccer and tennis teams had to play at the nearby Germantown Cricket Club. This developed a relationship between the club and the school that would last until the move. As there was no pool on the campus, the swim team practiced at the Germantown YMCA or in the nearby suburbs.
The site was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1972.
Plymouth Meeting is a census-designated place (CDP) that straddles Plymouth and Whitemarsh Townships in Montgomery County, Pennsylvania, United States. The settlement was founded in 1686.
Germantown is an area in Northwest Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Founded by Palatine, Quaker, and Mennonite families in 1683 as an independent borough, it was absorbed into Philadelphia in 1854. The area, which is about six miles northwest from the city center, now consists of two neighborhoods: 'Germantown' and 'East Germantown'.
Germantown Academy, informally known as GA and originally known as the Union School, is the oldest nonsectarian day school in the United States. The school was founded on December 6, 1759, by a group of prominent Germantown citizens in the Green Tree Tavern on the Germantown Road. Germantown Academy enrolls students from pre-kindergarten to 12th grade and is located in the Philadelphia suburb of Fort Washington, having moved from its original Germantown campus in 1965. The original campus is listed on the National Register of Historic Places. The school shares the oldest continuous high school football rivalry with the William Penn Charter School.
East Falls is a neighborhood in Lower Northwest, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States. It lies on the east bank of the "Falls of the Schuylkill," cataracts submerged in 1822 by the Schuylkill Canal and Fairmount Water Works projects. East Falls sits next to the Germantown, Roxborough, Allegheny West, and the Nicetown-Tioga neighborhoods. Wissahickon Valley Park separates it from Manayunk, Philadelphia.
The Germantown White House is a historic mansion in the Germantown section of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. It is the oldest surviving presidential residence, having twice housed Founding Father George Washington during his presidency.
The Colonial Germantown Historic District is a designated National Historic Landmark District in the Germantown and Mount Airy neighborhoods of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania along both sides of Germantown Avenue. This road followed a Native American path from the Delaware River just north of Old City Philadelphia, through Germantown, about 6 miles northwest of Center City Philadelphia, and on to Pottstown. Settlement in the Germantown area began, at the invitation of William Penn, in 1683 by Nederlanders and Germans under the leadership of Francis Daniel Pastorius fleeing religious persecution.
Glynn Academy (GA) is an American public high school in Brunswick, Georgia, United States, enrolling 1,900 students in grades 9–12. Along with Brunswick High School, it is one of two high schools in the Glynn County School System. Glynn Academy offers technical, academic, and Advanced Placement programs and is accredited by the Georgia Department of Education and the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools. The school has consistently been ranked among the top public high schools in the United States by Newsweek.
West Nottingham Academy is an independent co-ed school serves both boarding and day students in grades 9-12. It was founded in 1744 by the Presbyterian preacher Samuel Finley, who later became President of The College of New Jersey, which is now Princeton University. The 124-acre (0.50 km2), tree-lined campus is in Colora, Maryland near the Chesapeake Bay, an hour south of Philadelphia and 45 minutes north of Baltimore.
Grumblethorpe was the home of the Wister family in the present-day Germantown section of Philadelphia, who lived there for over 160 years. It was built in 1744 as a summer residence, but it became the family's year-round residence in 1793. It is a museum, part of the Colonial Germantown Historic District.
Beggarstown or Bettelhausen was a small community that was located in the present day neighborhood of Mount Airy in Northwest Philadelphia in the U.S. state of Pennsylvania. It centered primarily along a stretch of relatively flat land along Germantown Avenue roughly between Upsal Street and Gorgas Lane.
Cliveden, also known as the Chew House, is a historic site owned by the National Trust for Historic Preservation, located in the Germantown neighborhood of Northwest Philadelphia. Built as a country house for attorney Benjamin Chew, Cliveden was completed in 1767 and was home to seven generations of the Chew family. Cliveden has long been famous as the site of the American Revolutionary War's Battle of Germantown in 1777 as well as for its Georgian architecture.
The Pennsylvania School for the Deaf is the third-oldest school of its kind in the United States. Its founder, David G. Seixas (1788–1864), was a Philadelphia crockery maker-dealer who became concerned with the plight of impoverished deaf children who he observed on the city's streets. The current school building is listed by the National Register of Historic Places, and two former campuses are similarly recognized.
The Evansburg Historic District in Evansburg, Pennsylvania, United States, is a National Historic District designated by Congress with over 50 National Register properties dating from the early 18th through 19th century. Almost all of these properties are privately owned and in active use at this time. The Evansburg Historic District was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1972.
The former District School No. 14 building is located on Academy Street in Pine Hill, New York, United States. It is a concrete-sided frame building erected in the mid-1920s.
The Tulpehocken Station Historic District is a historic area in the Germantown neighborhood of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Large suburban houses were built in the area from about 1850 to 1900 in a variety of styles including Carpenter Gothic, Italianate, and Bracketed as part of the Picturesque Movement of architecture. In the 1870s styles moved toward High Victorian and Second Empire. The district was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1985, and it covers about six square blocks, bounded by McCallum Street on the north, the Pennsylvania Railroad tracks on the south, Tulpehocken Street on the west, and Walnut Lane on the east. Thirty-seven buildings in the district are considered to be significant and 118 are considered to be contributing, with only 13 considered to be intrusions.
The Concord School House is a historic one-room schoolhouse in the Germantown section of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. It is operated today as a museum. It is part of the Colonial Germantown Historic District which was named a National Historic Landmark District in 1965.
The Awbury Historic District is a historic area in the East Germantown neighborhood of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. It encompasses the former summer homes and farms of the extended Cope family, who moved to the area starting in 1849 and the entire Awbury Arboretum, which occupies most of the district's area, as well as adjacent properties developed and occupied by Henry Cope (1793-1865), son and successor to prominent Philadelphia Orthodox Quaker merchant Thomas Pym Cope (1768-1854), his close relatives, and his descendants. The district, which has been described by Philadelphia area historians as "visually distinct from the densely-built urban blocks that surround it on three sides, and from the level, open landscape of the city park to the northwest," features buildings which were designed in the Gothic Revival, Italian Villa, Queen Anne, Tudor Revival, Shingle, and Colonial Revival styles of architecture between 1849 and 1922.
The Beggarstown School, built c. 1740, is a historic school in Beggarstown, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, now part of the Mount Airy neighborhood. It is a rare example of a school building from the colonial era.
Germantown Grammar School, also known as Lafayette Grammar School and Opportunities Industrial Center, Inc., are two historic school buildings located in the Germantown neighborhood of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
Germantown Lutheran Academy (GLA) was founded in 1965 and began operating a high school at the historic school campus previously occupied by Germantown Academy at Schoolhouse Lane and Green Street in the Germantown section of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Mr. John Dutton, the founding headmaster of Germantown Lutheran Academy, along with three teachers opened the school doors to thirty-four students in the fall of 1965. Each year the faculty would extend invitations to students to attend the next school year based on academic merit and contributions to campus life. A number of the school's faculty were commissioned teachers from the Lutheran Church–Missouri Synod.