Old Main, Bethany College

About this property

Old Main, Bethany College is a historic building group on the Bethany College campus in Bethany, West Virginia. It was constructed from 1858–1871 on a design by architect James Keys Wilson with the firm of Walter & Wilson (with William Walter) and is an important surviving example of 19th-century Gothic Revival architecture. Wilson became a renowned architect in Cincinnati, Ohio. Wilson's design was influenced by James Renwick Jr., whose office he studied in, and may have been modeled after Renwick's Smithsonian Museum (constructed 1845–1847) design. Wilson was in partnership with William Walter, an older architect, at the time of Old Main's construction but the design was most likely Wilson's "because his training had occurred during the increasing vogue of the Gothic style". William Kimbrough Pendleton, a faculty member and vice-president of Bethany College also had a role and contributed his practical knowledge of architecture with the supervision of construction and has been credited with responsibility for its placement on the crest of the hill as well as suggesting the arcade (architecture) on the back of the building. He may also have been responsible for the installation of firewalls, which permitted it to survive the 1879 fire that destroyed Society Hall. The building was constructed from 1858 and 1871 and "represents" the college's "pivotal historical role as the headquarters of Alexander Campbell (1788–1866), a principal founder of the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ)." The college "is the fountainhead institution of more than a hundred colleges and universities established in the United States by the church." It is "intimately linked to the Scots-Irish ethnic settlement of the American frontier," and "Old Main is one of the country's earliest intact large-scale examples of collegiate Gothic architecture." A 1909 photo shows the coal smokestacks on the roofline. John F. Kennedy spoke at its Commencement Hall in 1960 during his presidential primary campaign that won West Virginia. Old Main was declared a National Historic Landmark in 1990. The Old Main building includes Commencement Hall, used for concerts, convocations, lectures, dramatic presentations, special functions, dinners, and other gatherings; Kirkpatrick Hall of Life Sciences, devoted to biology, microbiology, and botany laboratories, a greenhouse, faculty offices, a student library and conference room, a psychology computer laboratory, an experimental psychology laboratory, an animal research laboratory, a cold room for experiments, classrooms relating to the life sciences, a classroom for environmental science, and a student psychology lounge; the Media Center, used for administration, use, storing and dispensing of media equipment; the Academic Parlour, used for lectures, receptions, and special gatherings; the Trustee Board Room, used for board of trustees meetings; Trustee Hall of Fame Room, used for receptions; Office of the Vice President and Dean of Faculty, a suite of rooms to the left of the main entrance; Office of the President, a suite of rooms to the right of the main entrance; seminar rooms; webmaster information technology center; and classrooms, many of which are dedicated to professors, alumni, trustees, administrators. The first completed portion of Old Main, what college founder Alexander Campbell called the New Edifice, was Society Hall, which provided for the literary societies and their libraries, as well as a temporary chapel. It later burned in 1879.

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Property data from the National Register of Historic Places, National Park Service (public domain).

Description adapted from Wikipedia under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.

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