Other name | West Virginia College at Flemington Flemington College |
|---|---|
| Type | Private university |
| Active | 1865 (opened) [1] 1868 (established by the legislature) [2] –1895 |
Religious affiliation | Free Will Baptist |
| Location | , , United States 39°16′01.7″N80°07′09.1″W / 39.267139°N 80.119194°W |
| Campus | Rural |
| Journal | Graphic |
  Location of West Virginia College in West Virginia | |
West Virginia College was a private Free Will Baptist college in Flemington in the U.S. state of West Virginia.
At the close of the American Civil War, Reverend Flavius J. Cather and the Free Will Baptists sought to establish an institution of higher education in Flemington, located in Taylor County, West Virginia. [1] [3] This institution was intended as a successor to the Free Will Baptists' Rector College in nearby Pruntytown, which had ceased operations in 1855, [1] and was destroyed by fire in 1857. [3] In September 1865, the Free Will Baptists opened West Virginia College. [1]
On May 1, 1866, a corporation was created for West Virginia College "for the purpose of establishing an institution of learning, in which the ordinary branches of an English and classical education may be taught." [4] The nine shareholders of this corporation initially subscribed a total of $5,000 in capital. [4] [a] Secretary of State of West Virginia Granville D. Hall certified this agreement on February 19, 1867. [4]
The following year, the West Virginia Legislature passed an act incorporating West Virginia College in Flemington on June 26, 1868. [2] [5] This act established a governing body known as the Stockholders of West Virginia College, which was composed of 24 corporators responsible for the oversight and management of the college's real estate, infrastructure, other property, assets, and rights. [2] [b] The legislation granted authority to Jesse H. Cather, the president of the college's stockholders, and David Powell, the secretary, to convene a meeting for the purpose of electing the board of directors, which would be known as the Trustees of West Virginia College. [6] The act concluded that the corporation's capital stock shall not exceed $500,000, divided into shares of $25 each. [7]
When the act was passed in 1868, West Virginia College had approximately 120 students enrolled, including 20 students in its collegiate department. [1] In September 1868, Reverend Alvin D. Williams was elected college president. [8] Williams also served as a travelling secretary for West Virginia College for the purposes of fundraising for the institution until his appointment as general superintendent of West Virginia free schools in February 1870. [9]
Williams was succeeded as president by his assistant Reverend William Colegrove in 1870. [10] [11] Colegrove had previously joined West Virginia College as a professor of languages in 1868. [11] In 1874, Colegrove began operating West Virginia College as a private institution, which it remained until its closure. [10] In 1878, the Grafton Sentinel reported that an "Algebraic problem whose solution had been pronounced impossible was taken to West Virginia College" and solved by the then-president in less than five minutes using his new method. [12] In 1879, college president Colegrove authored the college textbook, A Complete Scientific Grammar of the English Language. [13] [14]
The 1876 Report of the Commissioner of Education stated that West Virginia College had seven instructors, 31 preparatory students, four collegiate students, property valued at $15,000, and 574 volumes in its library. [15] However, by 1880, West Virginia College was staffed by two instructors and had an enrollment of 38 students. [16] Additionally, the institution's alumni comprised approximately 250 former students. [16] The college consisted of a "substantial brick building", still valued at $15,000, and its library contained 600 volumes. [16] The institution did not have an endowment. [15] [16]
Colegrove resigned from the presidency on February 19, 1880, and was succeeded by O. G. Augier. [17] By 1882, West Virginia College began publishing a monthly journal entitled the Graphic. [18] Augier stepped down as president on August 9, 1882, and was followed by Howard N. Ogden, who served for one year. [17] Ogden was then succeeded by Reverend W. E. Joliffe, who held the position until July 26, 1887. [17] Following Joliffe, Reverend T. E. Peden took over as president. [17] During this time, West Virginia College struggled to secure additional investments and experienced low enrollment. [19] During the academic year of 1894-1895, Haywood Fleming served as acting president, after which the institution was no longer mentioned in official state reports and ceased operations. [19] The final reported graduation at the college was held on May 17, 1894. [20]
West Virginia College's facilities consisted of a small two-story red brick building. [21] During the construction of the building, the residents of Flemington made the bricks to save costs because ordering the bricks was too expensive. [3] Following the school's closure in 1895, the West Virginia College building housed a normal school for six years before its transfer to Taylor County Schools ownership in 1901. [17] [21] In 1902, the building became one of the state's first district high schools. [21] The building then served as Flemington High School until it was demolished in the 1950s. [21]
In December 1868, the West Virginia Legislature renamed the Agricultural College of West Virginia in Morgantown to West Virginia University. [22] [23] This change was partly made to distinguish it from West Virginia College, the name of which caused confusion in mail distribution to the two institutions. [23] [24] West Virginia historian Charles Henry Ambler remarked of West Virginia College, "All told, the college department did not graduate more than two score students, but it maintained high standards and thus left worthy traditions." [10] In 1982, the West Virginia Department of Culture and History erected a historical marker for West Virginia College at Flemington Elementary School on Simpson Road (West Virginia Secondary Route 13). [25] The marker reads: [25]
Opened on this site in 1865 by Free Will Baptists led by local resident Rev. F. J. Cather. Chartered by the legislature June 26, 1868. Rev. A. D. Williams became first president and served until 1870 when he resigned to become Supt. of Free Schools in W. Va. It functioned into the 1890's when reduced enrollments forced its closing. Building served Flemington High School until razed in 1950's.
Francis Harrison Pierpont, called the "Father of West Virginia," was an American lawyer and politician who achieved prominence during the American Civil War. During the conflict's first two years, Pierpont served as Governor of the Restored Government of Virginia and, in this capacity, administered the part of Virginia then under Unionist control before West Virginia's admission to the Union as a separate state. After recognizing the creation of West Virginia, Pierpont continued to serve as Governor of the Restored Government. However, the degree of civil authority he could exercise was minimal for the remainder of the war. Having claimed to be the legitimate Governor of Virginia for the duration of the conflict, Pierpont assumed civil control of the state's entire post-1863 territory following the dissolution of the Confederacy and continued to serve as Governor during the early years of Reconstruction.
John Baptist Purcell was an American prelate of the Catholic Church. He served as Bishop of Cincinnati from 1833 to his death in 1883, and he was elevated to the rank of archbishop in 1850. He formed the basis of Father Ferrand, the Ohio-based "Irish by birth, French by ancestry" character in the prologue of Willa Cather's historical novel Death Comes for the Archbishop who goes to Rome asking for a bishop for New Mexico Territory.
Storer College was a historically Black college in Harpers Ferry, West Virginia, that operated from 1867 to 1955. A national icon for Black Americans, in the town where the 'end of American slavery began', as Frederick Douglass famously put it, it was a unique institution whose focus changed several times. There is no one category of college into which it fits neatly. Sometimes white students studied alongside Black students, which at the time was prohibited by law at state-regulated schools in West Virginia and the other Southern states.
James Edwin Campbell was an American educator, school administrator, newspaper editor, poet, and essayist. Campbell was the first principal of the West Virginia Colored Institute from 1892 until 1894, and is considered by the university as its first president.
John William Dunjee was an American missionary, educator, Baptist minister, publisher, agent of Storer College and founder of Baptist churches across the United States.
Marshall Silas Cornwell was a 19th-century American newspaper publisher and editor, writer and poet in the U.S. state of West Virginia. Cornwell was a younger brother of railroad and timber executive William B. Cornwell (1864–1926) and West Virginia Governor John Jacob Cornwell (1867–1953).
Alexander W. Monroe was a prominent American lawyer, politician, and military officer in the U.S. states of Virginia and West Virginia. Monroe served as a member of the Virginia House of Delegates and West Virginia House of Delegates representing Hampshire County. He was the Speaker of the West Virginia House of Delegates during the 1875–1877 legislative session. Monroe also represented Hampshire County in the West Virginia Constitutional Convention of 1872.
Samuel Lightfoot Flournoy was an American lawyer, politician, and businessperson in the U.S. state of West Virginia. Flournoy served as a state senator representing the 12th Senatorial District in the West Virginia Senate (1885–1890) and served three terms as mayor of Romney, West Virginia. Flournoy unsuccessfully ran as a candidate for the West Virginia Democratic Party gubernatorial nomination in 1900.
John Collins Covell was a 19th-century American educator and school administrator specializing in deaf education in the U.S. states of Virginia and West Virginia.
Henry Bell Gilkeson was an American lawyer, politician, school administrator, and banker in West Virginia.
Howard Hille Johnson was a blind American educator and writer in the states of Virginia and West Virginia. Johnson was instrumental in the establishment of the West Virginia Schools for the Deaf and Blind in 1870, after which he taught blind students at the institution's School for the Blind for 43 years.
Romney Classical Institute was a 19th-century coeducational collegiate preparatory school in Romney, Virginia, United States, between 1846 and shortly after 1866. Romney had previously been served by Romney Academy, but by 1831 the school had outgrown its facilities. The Virginia General Assembly permitted the Romney Literary Society to raise funds for a new school through a lottery. On December 12, 1846, the assembly established the school and empowered the society with its operation.
Edwin Maxwell was an American lawyer, judge, and politician in the U.S. state of West Virginia. Maxwell served as Attorney General of West Virginia in 1866 and was an associate justice of the Supreme Court of Appeals of West Virginia from 1867 until 1872. He was elected to the West Virginia Senate and the West Virginia House of Delegates.
William C. Clayton was an American educator, lawyer, politician, and businessperson in the U.S. state of West Virginia. Clayton served in the West Virginia Senate representing the Eleventh Senatorial District of West Virginia from 1875 until 1879. He was twice principal of the Romney Classical Institute in Romney in 1853 and 1866.
Thomas Sylvester Riley was an American lawyer, politician, and businessperson who was based in West Virginia. Riley was the state's eleventh attorney general from March 4, 1893, until March 3, 1897.
John Warren Davis was an American educator, college administrator, and civil rights leader. He was the fifth and longest-serving president of West Virginia State University in Institute, West Virginia, a position he held from 1919 to 1953. Born in Milledgeville, Georgia, Davis relocated to Atlanta in 1903 to attend high school at Atlanta Baptist College. He worked his way through high school and college at Morehouse and graduated with a Bachelor of Arts degree in 1911. At Morehouse, Davis formed associations with John Hope, Mordecai Wyatt Johnson, Samuel Archer, Benjamin Griffith Brawley, Booker T. Washington, and W. E. B. Du Bois. He completed graduate studies in chemistry and physics at the University of Chicago from 1911 to 1913 and served on the faculty of Morehouse as the registrar and as a professor in chemistry and physics. While in Atlanta, Davis helped to found one of the city's first chapters of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP).
James McHenry Jones was an American educator, school administrator, businessperson, and minister. Jones was the third principal of the West Virginia Colored Institute from 1898 until 1909 and is considered by West Virginia State as the institution's third president.
John Henry Hill was an American lawyer, educator, school administrator, and military officer. He was the second principal of the West Virginia Colored Institute from 1894 until 1898. West Virginia State considers him its second president.
Celeste Brackett Newcomer was an American educator, bank director, and clubwoman based in Harpers Ferry, West Virginia.
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