Oglethorpe University - Yamacraw Yearbook (Atlanta, GA)

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Oglethorpe — An Historical Sketch ON a long, low ridge, called Midway, near Milledgeville, Old Ogle- thorpe grew from a state normal training school into an historic university, whose renowned halls gave Georgia some of her greatest men, and gave the world our own Sidney Lanier. Oglethorpe College was formally opened in 1835 under the direction of the Synod of Georgia. Princeton College had been growing in New Jersey, and was largely patronized by the youth of the entire nation, and especially this section of the South. Owing to the long distances, which must be traveled on horseback, it was suggested that a college similar to Princeton be founded in the South. This suggestion materialized, and Oglethorpe College was the outcome. Old Oglethorpe was the first denominational insti- tution of learning to be founded below the Virginia line, between the Atlantic and Pacific, and we justly claim that she was the mother of all that brilliant group of colleges which were built in this area. The same idea, characteristic of the New Oglethorpe, of getting men of the highest educational attainments to hold professorships is revealed by such names ' as the following, who were members of the Oglethorpe College Faculty: Joseph Le Conte, the eminent geologist; James Woodrow, uncle of President Woodrow Wilson, Professor of Science; Samuel K. Talmadge, the brilliant administrator, and many others. The facilities of Oglethorpe College were as good as could be had at that time. The main building was considered to be the handsomest in the South- east, and contained the finest college chapel in the United States, not except- ing Yale, Harvard, oi Princeton. In the President ' s office today may be seen a crayon drawing of Sidney Lanier, an Oglethorpe alumnus of world-wide fame, showing him when he was fifteen years old, his age when he entered college. Hanging beside this picture is his diploma, bearing the name of the then president of Oglethorpe, Dr. Samuel K. Talmadge. We do not hesitate to say that any college would pay a fabulous sum for them, if the honor of having graduated so famous a poet could be included in the bargain. It is needless to say that we value the

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i John H. Goff Editor-in-Chief Morton T. Nicholes Associate Editor L. Newton Turk, Jr Associate Editor J. Render Terrell, Jr Historian William C. Johnson . Bus. Mgr. and Asst. Sporting Ed. Robert G. Nicholes . . Adv. Mgr. and Sporting Editor Chas. S. Tidwell Assistant Business Manager Warren C. Maddox Prophet Henry M. Bonny Poet Francis Y. Fife Cartoonist

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privilege of claiming Lanier as one of our alumni. Some day there will be erected on the Oglethorpe campus a beautiful memorial building to him, our foremost and most distinguished graduate. Shortly after the graduation of Lanier, the Northern and Southern States became at odds, and the deplorable Civil War followed. Lanier and all of his college comrades who could qualify, with the greater number of the facuhy, answered the call of the South. Being so thoroughly convinced that the South was in the right, and so imbued with Southern rights, Oglethorpe shut its doors; her student body marched away to meet their Northern brothers. Not satisfied with furnish- ing all of her available man power, Oglethorpe invested her funds in Con- federate bonds. Her beautiful main building was used as a hospital and barracks, and was later burned. An effort was made to revive the institution after the war, but the dark days of the reconstruction and the insolvency of the South would not permit, and after a couple of years the doors were closed for the second time. But even in so short a while she graduated some distinguished men, among them a governor of Georgia. Oglethorpe died at Gettysburg, where she meekly bowed to the victorious armies of our brothers of the North. Old Oglethorpe lives today on the pages of history a stainless character, determined to let the world know that she was true to the principles of those who had founded her. Of all the strong colleges on the American continent, Oglethorpe alone died for her ideal. She loved the lofty conceptions of the South. And this spirit, we are proud to say, has been inherited by the Oglethorpe of today. She stands today, like the impregnable Gibraltar, a champion for right and justice to all. The humblest Freshman is given the same consideration as the highest officer. Each man of her first class will attest that fact. It is with bowed heads that we recall those days of adversity, when Ogle- thorpe answered the call of the stricken South, shut the doors of the college, and gave freely of her life on the battle fields. Her sacrifices and sorrows are our heritage, and today, standing in the full dawn of her renewed youth,