Davidson College

DAVIDSON COLLEGE INTIMATB PACH COMPILBD IY CORNELIA REBEKAH SHAW Librarian ILLUSTRATED Fleming H. Revell Press Naw You Copyright, 1923, by Wn.w11 J. MAlnN THIS VOLUMB 18 AFFBCTIONATILV DBDICATBD TO THI SONS OP DAVIDSON FOREWORD .. Tm story ot tho origin and growth of Davidson College, told for tho first timo in this volume, is typically Ame,ioan. The conseorated idealism of its founders, the bold experimenta• tfon · of its manual~labor infancy, its long and losing battle with poverty and indifference, its rescue by an overruling Providence through the splendid munificence of Maxwell Chambers, the ac cumulating momentum of recent years, its present stability and far-reaching usefuln~, its promise for the future-these con sHtuto a thrilling panorama ol divine Providence and human heroism, Its unselfish builders rest from their multiplied la bors, but in endless and ever-increasing beneficence their works .do follow them. Our world has leamed some startling lessons since the new cen. tury began its course. It knows now, as never before, that mere earthly lenrnhlg, human art and science and inventive genius, the harnessing of nature's giant forces, the production of illimit able wealth and undreamed of luxuries, if these are untouched by religious love and self sacrifice, cannot develop or even pre serve our hard-won civilization; that no gifts are more fatal to human welfare than wealth and leisure without moral culture, liberty without self-control, and unUmf ted power without jus tice or mercy; that in this age of revolution and reconstruction 01,,rlstian leadership is the one and only hope o.f imperfled and bewildered Ohristendom. No wonder, therefore, that the wise and far-seeing are every where 1•allying to the support ot Ohr,stian institutions of learn ing, and that our Southern Presbyterians now realize, as never before, the immense debt they ·owe Davidson College, their most important and successful nursery of conseorawd leadership. That Christian liberalf ty may flow in a golden stream to its material support, that those .who direct its afl'airs may be granted divine wisdom for their divine task, and that every·pass ing year may broaden ita useftdncss and increase ihl power is the wish· and earnest prayer of every heart]ti~f'loves both God and man. HENav Loms SHtTH Lexington,. Va,, June 29th, 1923 CONTENTS CRAPl'II . PAOI I THI S111>-SOWING • • • • • • • • • • 1 II Tua BEOINNING • • • • • • • • • • 11 Ill STRENGTHENING THB STAKES • • • • • • • 50 IV THB ClVJL WAR PERIOD AND DECADE FOLLOWING • 98 V THE PERIOD OP TRANSITION • • • • • • • 145 VI THE PERIOD OP EXPANSION • , • , • , , 115 VII Tus CUJWcutuM AND M1scBLLANBA • • • • 19i' VIII STUDENT LIPE AND CAMPUS ACTIVITIES • • • 231 IX DAVIDSON MaN IN THE WoRuls Woax • . • . 264 APPENDIX: I SOURCES • • • • • • • • • • • • • 2'1'1 II FIRST CHAllTER OP DAVIDSON CoLLEGE, WITH AMBNDMBNTS • • • • • • • • • • 2'18 III ORATORS· B1rou THE LITERARY s·oc11rr1KS • • • 282 IV SCHOLARSHIPS , , , , , , • , , , , 285 V SEVBNTY•FtPTH ANNIVERSARY PROGRAM , , , • 289 VI CLASSICAL SCHOOLS GROUPlil> BY CoUNTIIS, AND 0rHBR CHRONOLOGIES, ARRANGED BY A. J. Moa- RISON , , , , • • • • • , , , , 294 VII ·RANK o, DAVIDSON MaN IN THE C1v1t WAa • • 29'1 VIII RANK or DAVIDSON MEN IN THI EuaoPBAN WAR • 298 JX OLD RULES • . • • • • • • • • • • • 300 X CoLLEOlt HYMNS , , , , , , , , , , 301 XI ADDITIONAL TUTORS AND AssISTINO PaorESSORS • 303 XII AaTICLB FROM THB Soulhwn Citlsen, Fs11u- ARY 18, 183'/ , , • , , , ,· , , , 304 lNDBX • • • • • • • • • • , • • • • • 311 ILLUSTRATIONS FACING PAGI CHAMBERS Bun.n1No • • • • • • • • • • • Tllle MORRISON STATEMENT • • , • • • , • , • , 12 THE OLD CHAPEL • • • • • • • • • • • • 22 ROBERT HALL MORRISON , , , , , , , , , , 24 THE Rows • • • • • • • • • • • • • • 28 SAMUEL WILLIAMSON , , , • • , , , • , • 50 PROGRAM, COMMENCEMENT DAY, 1842 , • , • , , 54 FORM OF REPORT, 1847 , , . , , . • , • . • 58 SCHOLARSHIP CERTIFICATE • • • • • • , , , • 62 DRURY LACY • • • • • • • • • • • · • • • 82 AN INVITATION OP THE FIF-rIES , , , • , , • • 85 JOHN LYCAN KIRKPATRICK • , • , , , • • , • 98 GEORGE WILSON MCPHAIL • • • • • • • • • • 122 CLUB PROGRAM • • • • • • • • • • • • • 128 JOHN RBNNIE BLAKE • • • • • • • • • • • 136 ANDREW Dou\A HEPBURN • • • • • • • • • • 148 LUTHER McKINNON , • • • • • • • , , , 160 JOUN BUNYAN SHEARER , , , , , • , , , , 164 HENRY Louis SMITH • • • • • • • • • • • 176 WILLIAM JOSEPH MARTIN , • , , , , • • , , 184 VtEW OP CAMPUS • • • • • • • • • • • • 234 PlIILANTTIROPIC AND EUMENIAN SOCIETY HALLS • , , 248 DAVIDSON COLLEGE CHAPTER I THE SEED-SOWING THE story of the growth of education in North Carolina before the coming of the Scotch-Irish and of the Scotch Pres byterians during the first half of the eighteenth century, could be compressed into a few pages. This is true also of the social, political, and industrial advancement of the period. A part of this tide of immigration entering the ports of Charles• ton, Wilmington, and Philadelphia, met in the center of the State, away from the tidewater and east of the mountains, in a territory comprising less than one-third of its area. Here they were joined by a stalwart German contingent coming in from 1150 to 1?70, composed of public spirited men of fair education, thrifty and prosperous. The Scotch people who formed King James• ,,.Irish Plantation" in Ulster possessed much more colonizing energy· than those who remained in the home country. From Ireland about two hundred thousand, or one-third of the Protestant population, came to America between 1725 and 1768, the exodus being due largely to trade restrictions, religious persecution and exorbitant rents. These frontiersmen possessed industrious habits, simple virtues, and a love of freedom which urged them forth into the foreign wilderness. They prized knowledge and religion beyond all price. They were thrifty to a d~gree that has made them a by-word, and their joy in the ownership of land was a natural outcome of generations of tenantry. The Hjghland-Scotcb entering America by the Cape Fear ports wefe of afmost pure Celtic blood. there being this marked racial as well as a geographical distinction between them and their fellow countrymen-the Saxons from the Lowland~who had reached the colotties after a hundred or more years of resi• dence in Ireland. They planted their homes in the territory now 1 2 Davidson College comprising the counties of Cumberland, Harn~Jt, Moore, Mont• gomery, Anson, Richmond and Robeson, while the Scotch-Irish settled in Alamance, Guilford, Orange, Rowan, Cabarrus, Ire• dell, Lincoln and Gaston counties, the flood centering in Mecklen• burg. · These pioneers arrived at their journeys' end in wagons which became homes to the families until the round pole cabins and mud chimneys could be built. Between the Yadkin and the Catawba rivers settled the Alex anders, Grahams, Morrisons, McDowells, Oshornes, Irwins, Pharrs, Griers, Ramseys, Wilsons, Johnstons, Davidsons, Hat rises, Caldwells, and many others who were invaluable to the State in its formative period. As soon as a group was settled preparations were made for religious services and when the log church was erected it became also a schoolhouse, a community center, and_ the foundation of the nation. A classical school was begun about 1760 in the hounds of Center congregation, near Belle Mont, where Alexander Osborne had settled a few years prior to that time. It was located in what is now Iredell County, two and a half miles north of the site later chosen for Davidson College, and bore the unclassical name of Crowfield Academy. It prospered until the British in vasion. Tradition says that this community and congregation furnished five captains and fifty-three soldiers to the patriot army. In ·the school men were prepared fot the College of New Jersey, then known as Nassau Hall, the official title of which, since 1896, is Princetott University. Students came to it from all parts of the South and from the West Indies. One of its pupils, Rev. James McRee, born May 10, 1752, where Captain Reid Morrison now lives; entered the Junior clan.of Nassau Hall from Crowfield and returned to North Carolina to give his life to servitJg Steele Creek and Center Churches. * From Center he received calls to pastorates in PhiJ•delphia and Princeton, but he elected to retr.ain. with.the peop16 'r.f his home section. Always an advocate of education, he devoted a large part of bis latter years to the furtherance of schools and colleges. Other students of this tittle Crowfietd · Academy were Profes sor William Houston, of Nassau Hall, Colonel Adlai Osborne, a trus~ee of the State University, Dr. Ephraim Brevard, the beloved The Seed-Sowing 3 physician who framed the Mecklenburg Declaration of Indepen• dence, Rev. Josiah Lewis, Rev. James Hall, who founded Clio's Nursery, a school in the bounds of Bethany congregation, and Rev. Saanuel Eusebius McCorkle, who for a long period con• ducted Zion-Parnassus Academy1 · A school in Sugar Creek congregation, twenty miles south of Davidson was chartered in 1770 by the Provincial J..egislature as Queen's Museum, wJth the rank of college, but carrying no en dowment from the province. It stood on the site of the present courthouse of Mecklenburg County. The charter was imme diat~ly annulled by George III. despite the cotnpliment to his wife. It was amended an4 granted anew by the Legislature of li'71 and promptly annulled by the King and his council. · This time the charter was repealed by proclamation. An explanation of the King's antagonism

Load more