University of Tennessee Knoxville - Volunteer Yearbook (Knoxville, TN)

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12 Campus

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-w -Photographic Ht Services Westward Expansion Though students may often wonder, the university did not have its beginnings in the dark ages. It started as a private school in 1794 in a home on the Holston River and four years later it was moved tq a two- story frame building in downtown Knoxville. Finally, in 1826. trustees of the college bought 40 acres on ttthat hill west of Knoxville and named it Barbara Hill in honor of Barbara Blount. daughter of Gov. William Blount and one of the first stu- dents to graduate from the original Blount College. UT is the 28th oldest college in the nation and the oldest and Of the five buildings that made up Blount College in 1875. only South College Ifar leftl remains standing to- day. The three buildings at the top of the Hill. East College. Old College and West College, were used as a hospital by Confederate and later by the Union armies. The front building is Humes Hall, the first student dormitory and the center street below is Cumberland Avenue. now known as the Strip. largest in Tennessee. And, as Blount College, it was the first in the nation to adopt a coeducational policy. The college name was changed to East Tennessee College when an 1806 act of Congress granted public land to the college from the state. The school had been in serious financial trouble when its first president, Samuel Garrick, died in 1809. Failing to raise money to keep the college going, the building was used as a preparatory school and a night school tone of the firstl. But the college was eventually reopened in 1820. Twenty years later, the name was changed to East Tennessee University which enabled the school to offer programs in medicine and law. It may be hard to believe, but students and teachers used to carry buckets of water up the Hill for use during the class day. Finally. around 1850, a waterworks system was in- stalled. Water was pumped to the building through lead pipes by a waterwheel located at the bottom of the Hill. Unfortunately, the Con- federate army found better uses for the lead pipe in the Civil War when they tore it out for military use. Occupied dur- ing the war by both Union and Confederate troops, the uni- versity was temporarily closed. With the war over and BTU having been loyal to the Union, the school was provided with federal funds to build South College as a dormitory in 1872. In the early 19203, the Old College Building on top of the Hill was reconstructed and renamed Ayres Hall - which, over the years, has become the university's symbol. Humes Hall gone from the foreground, the newness of Buehler Hall already conceals the old South College building behind it. But just as the tower of Ayres Hall rises above the new. so will that tOWer always be a symbol of campus. elim Sexton Campusfl 3