George Washington University - Cherry Tree Yearbook (Washington, DC)

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THE GEORGE WASHINGTON UNIVERSITY: A SESQUICENTENNIAL ESSAY transformed the Convention into the Baptist Missionary Union, devoted solely and singly to the cause of missions, with the Southerners forming their own convention. As one of its last acts the Convention relinquished “all right, title and interest which they may have to the real estate or any other property” in the hands of the College. While any formal tie through property control by the Convention was now ended, the ordinances were not changed and Baptist organizations continued to seat a Baptist majority on the Board until 1865 when individual contributors were allowed to vote. Within a few years, the Board was made a self-perpe- tuating body, for the first time a layman was elected president of the University and an Episcopalian presi- dent of the Corporation. The hold of the denomination had been gradually relaxed by the force of circumstances and had now all but disappeared. FINANCIAL AND THEOLOGICAL WOES. There was just one relapse. Hoping by the change to attract massive support from a wealthy Baptist philan- thropist, sectarian control was established by charter revision from 1898 to 1904. Six years of complete frustration led to an enthusiastic resumption of the original charter. As logical as the progression to nonsectarian control seems, it is probably safe to say that, if at any time before 1904, large financial support from any Baptist sources had been tendered, that progression would have been interrupted. ' W ' .ASHIIS ' OTON INFIRMARY. CLINICAL DEPARTMENT. Just as significant as the relations of the College to the Baptist denomination is the influence of the expand- ing city on the institution. The College of 1821 had to provide for all of the needs of the students. It was often a very unwilling obligation that the institution had to accept. Student complaints about food have never been limited to any time or to any institution. Formal investigations made from time to time to see if the nuisance of affording living and feeding facilities could not be eliminated by ceasing to be a residential college led invariably to the same conclusion: the city could not afford proper accommodations for even so small a group. The Civil War and the melting away of the student body laid the question at rest for a few years. The small number of students who remained posed no real problem and College Hill was given over to military purposes. Once the war was ended, the question reboun- ded with new emphasis. Fig. 5 — The fifth President of the College, George Whitefield Samson, D.D. (1859 - 1871.) The Reverend Samson, incidentally performed the wedding ceremony of this portraits photographer to Miss Julia Handy. The photographer, the celebrated Civil War correspondent Mathew B. Brady. POST WAR COLLEGE HILL. The buildings were war worn and life in them rugged. No funds were available for a complete renovation or rebuilding. The change in the city itself pointed the way

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THE GEORGE WASHINGTON UNIVERSITY: A SESQUICENTENNIAL ESSAY much new construction. The size of the governmental establishment did not shrink. New activities such as those of the Pension Bureau demanded tremendous staffs. These civil servants represented a new clientele for higher education. They found themselves in a newly expanded town which had not yet caught up with the amenities of a great city. Opportunities for amusement and cultural enrichment were conspicuously absent. TURN OF THE CENTURY WASHINGTON. They could lounge in the hotel lobbies at Willard’s, the Metropolitan or National and gape at the great in the world of politics, at Indian chiefs here to petition the Great White Father, or the picturesque characters that the city has never lacked. There were Fine eating places like Harvey’s and famous saloons like 1234. But a fellow’s capacity, financial, gastronomic, and alcoholic, had limits. Those whose thirst was for self-improvement found an opportunity in the existence of a college coupled with the shortness of their working day. The Trustees, sensing the demand, organized experimentally a few after-hours courses on a self-supporting basis. The response was so gratifying, that they began to develop later classes for employed students. The part-time student became a major consideration in college plan- ning. Many of these young men had caught the Washington fever and saw through the study of law the gateway to a political career of eminence and power. The Law School was reopened in 1865. Fig. 7 — The S.E. corner of University Hall. The building in which Law School classes were held between 1884 - 1899, stood at the corner of 15th and H Streets. THE MOVE FROM COLLEGE HILL. The city had grown up to the college boundary. The institution was in dire financial straits. The plant was run down and there was no money for its wholesale renovation. Why not sell College Hill, take the money, build a plant in the heart of the city and in this convenient location build up the part-time student clientele which would use the same quarters used earlier for full-time students, and thus add vastly to revenue from tuition? This philosophy was adopted. Gradually on H Street, between 13th and 15th Streets, all of the departments were located in newly built structures. What had been a resident college now became an urban university. For not only had the name Columbian College been changed to Columbian University, but the offerings of the University had been broadened to a true university scope. Unfortunately, however, H Street did not become the royal road to affluence. What was gained from the sale of College Hill fell woefully short of the cost of the new and ambitious construction downtown. The necessary demands for giving a wide variety of courses, many on a graduate level, prevented the profitable conduct of instruction that had been hopefully but speciously expected. to a hoped for solution. The population of the city had mushroomed in size. The war had brought vast hordes of civil servants and military to the city. There had been Fig. 6 — • Sketch of Civil War College Hill, drawn by George Durfee. Durfee a Union soldier was encamped in the area in the Spring of 1862.