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Page 11 text:
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hammered in with a vengeance. It was not at all uncommon for an examination to last from six to eight hours. Each room in the Main Building of that day was heated via the pot-bellied stove and the old-fashioned fireplace which gave cheerful Ught from its glowing embers but Uttle heat. The Wofford student of that day arose before dawn and was frequently forced out into the biting cold of a winter ' s morning in search of firewood or water from a nearby well located not far from the site of what is today the John B. Cleveland Hall of Science. Classes lasted from dawn to dusk with few holidays and less recreation. The Wofford of that day was located in a rural area in the midst of an almost untouched wilderness. A dusty wagon road following roughly the track of present-day Church Street led into Spartanburg, then a sleepy Httle village composed of a few frame houses clustered around Morgan Square in nondescript fashion. During the administration of Dr. James H. Carlisle who succeeded Shipp, a startling period of growth set in, commencing in 1880 with the erection of Alumni Hall, a brick structure beautifully ornamented by ornated porticoes and white-washed wooden columns, which towered high above the surrounding landscape and seemed to touch the clouds. Within a few years Snyder Hall, today a freshman dormitory, had risen adjacent to Alumni and was situated near the ravine. These two structures were soon to compose the old Wofford Fitting School where young men deficient in scholastic training were prepared for college. These are only a few of the many and vast improve- ments inaugurated by the genious and driving vitality of Dr. Carlisle, who more than any other individual deserves to be called the father of Wofford College. This great man whose portrait is mounted with quiet dignity above the chapel rostrum was one of the foremost educators of his time, and loved Wof- ford with a passion such as only men of intellect and concern for humanity can muster. He found her poor and impoverished, struggling with desperation to make ends meet, and left it a flourishing institution of higher learning, well able to make its own way in the academic world. His administration saw also the construction of the Whiteford Smith Library, the John B. Alumni Hall and Snyder at the turn of the century. Wofford-P.C. football gome in 1927. Cleveland Hall of Science and other monuments to a genius which can never die. Tired and full of years Carlisle retired in 1909 and soon found his way to the land beyond the shadow. He was succeeded by Dr. Henry Nelson Snyder, at that time professor of English on the faculty of the college he was to serve so well in after years. Snyder, in whom many of his stu- dents saw a marked resemblance to Shakespeare in appearance, continued during his administration on the work so well begun by Carlisle. It was during the administration of the former that Carhsle Memorial Hall was erected to the memory of one of the bright lights of Southern education. Snyder, author of An Educational Odyssey, stood at the helm during the stormy days of World War I, the hectic era of the roaring twenties, and the hard and bitter years of the thirties which are best forgotten but never can be. The advent of World War II brought with it one of the severest crises in the history of the college. With Pearl Harbor came an ever-shrinking student body as one by one men marched to join the colors to fight and die in the name of God, country and liberty. The armed forces were quick to requisition the physical plant of the college for mili- tary training program. Soon the tramp of marching feet added something new to the magnificent panorama of Wofford his- tory. The students that remained upon the scene, a pitiful remnant of what once had been, attended Converse and the Spartanburg Junior College. With peace came revival and a new president. Snyder retired after well over four decades of service and was succeeded by Dr. Walter K. Greene who was destined to become for a time President of both Wofford and Columbia colleges simultaneously. Greene ' s administration saw new monu- ments to education rise one by one to crown the lands cape with majestic splendor. Nowhere in the annals of the college is there a record of so much being accomplished in so short a time. Ill health forced Greene ' s retirement after an all too short tenure of office. After a brief interval of a year, during which Dr. C. C. Nor- ton doubled as President and Dean of Administration, Dr. Francis Pendleton Gaines, Jr., Dean of Students at Southern Methodist University, was inaugurated amid elaborate cere- monies as the sixth President of Wofford College — a ceremony which was destined to be a superb keynote to commence a cen- tury of progress. 7
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Page 10 text:
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Raising the colors towards the end of World War I. dr.imaric legend of the lost cornerstone. A block of hollowed- out granite of considerable size was chosen to serve as a foun- dation stone for the Main Building, and consequently as a subject of the lines quoted above from Bishop Wightman ' s stirring address. Within its hollowed interior was placed a large lead box containing numerous valuable documents relating to the founding of the college and to the personal history of the founder and his family. There was, up until a very recent date, a fabulous legend current, sprung from sources unknown, the gist of which was as follows. Toward the close of the War Between the States, according to the legend. Union cavalry swept down through this section of the South, burning and pillaging. The favorite targets of their looting were the cornerstones of old buildings which often contained priceless relics and occa- sional!) items of monetary value in the form of bonds and securities. One dark winter ' s night, late in the war, (so goes one version of the story) word was received in Spartanburg that a detachment of blue-clad cavalry was approaching the town. The freemasons who had presided over the laying of the cornerstone feared that the object of their attentions a decade before might be stolen by the marauders, and, that same night, removed the granite block from its original position on the northeast corner of the building and concealed it, so went the since discredited legend, in some other portion of the edifice, possibly in one of the tall towers flanking the portico. The exact location of the cornerstone was forgotten in the turmoil of those turbulent days and until ver) ' recently eluded discovery, remaining the source of heated speculation down through the ears. Duiing the days of reconstruction, amid the disorder of the timcN, the aliiablc relic was forgotten. The men who re- mo ed it that dark, siorm - night dared to trust no one with their secret in the da s when the carpetbaggers rided and ruin was spix ' ad throughotu the land. S the time the lawless era had ended, all who knew the exact location of the missing relic were eithei ' dead or hail v.tnished, none knew where. So went a rom.mtic legeni.1 groiuul n absurdit but marxeloush ' fasci- n.itnig ne ei tlieless. I here was, however, one salient fact of undoubted truth ui this extremeU colorful saga of another da ' . 1 lie cornerstone was lost; whether h carelessness or in some manner more thrdhng ' as not known. The question of its location was agitated by college antiquarians down through the years and just prior to the writing of this article was still an unsolved enigma. It was only during this the centennial year, however, that a really scientific and systematic search was insti- tuted for the missing memorial, involving the most modern scientific equipment and the finest scholarship available. A mine detector was to be employed to comb every inch of the century- old Main Building in studied determination to divest her silent walls of the mysterious secret they had held so long. The search commenced on an unusually warm and sunny November morning and ended three hours later in apparent failure. Only once was there a strong reaction from the me- chanical device employed, and this to the great disappointment of the curious onlookers turned out to be only a rusty nail of no great antiquity. It remained for a freshman, George Duffie, to find information leading to the location of the long-sought objects of such frantic searching. While browsing through moldering piles of old and dusty manuscripts, lying neglected and forgotten upon an obscure shelf in an almost unused corner of the Whiteford Smith Library, Duffie and a companion stumbled across an antedated copy of the Southern Christian Advocate containing an article from the pen of Bishop Wight- man, locating in precise detail the exact position of the missing granite. On the basis of this new information the search was renewed, this time at the northea.st corner of the Main Building, resulting very quickly in the uncovering of the long-sought foundation monument. Ante-Bellum days saw not only the disappearance of the cornerstone but more happily the steady expansion of the college both in regard to physical plant and enrollment. It was during this era under the able leadership of the col- lege ' s second president, gray-bearded A. M. Shipp, that the lit- erary societies and the Greek letter social fraternities began to rise into prominence. After President Shipp resigned in 187 5 the college entered upon a great period of physical expansion. In Shipp ' s day the entire physical plant was to all intents and purposes concentrated in what is today Main Building, including classrooms, dormitory space and dining hall and library. Greek and Latin were the principal subjects taught and they were Senior class at the turn of the century, about 1897. 6
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