Wofford College - From The Archives

Student Body 1891-92

Student Body 1891-92
Originally uploaded by Wofford Archives

This photo from the winter of 1891-92 shows the students in front of Main Building. Notice how many of them are wearing hats. You can see a few students sitting on the steps or in one of the doors to the building.

Click on the image to see a larger view over on my Flickr page.  When you get over to Flickr, click on the "all sizes" button, just above the photo, to see a larger version of the image.

Student Body 1897-98

Student Body 1897-98
Originally uploaded by Wofford Archives

We're doing a lot of photo digitizing this summer in the archives, and today, I'm sharing a picture of the student body during the 1897-1898 school year. Notice the women students in the front row. In 1897, the college embarked on what proved to be a short-lived experiment in coeducation.
I hope you'll check out a larger version of this photo on my flickr page. Click on the image to go there.  

Cleveland Science Hall

When Henry Nelson Snyder became president of Wofford in 1902, he knew the college's physical facilities were becoming inadequate.  During the first ten years of his administration, Snyder brought more new buildings to the campus than had been built since the original campus was built.  In addition to a residence hall and a new library, Snyder moved the science departments into a brand new science hall, the first new academic building on campus since Main Building.  

The story goes that Professor Daniel DuPre, who was the head of the science faculty, approached his Wofford classmate John Bomar Cleveland, then one of the wealthiest members both of the alumni association and in Spartanburg, with a bold proposition.  "John, you're well off financially, you ought to do something for your college.  We need some help to build a new science hall."  After asking for a ballpark figure, Cleveland considered the request silently for several moments.  Then, he told Professor DuPre to go ahead with the plan and to send all the bills to him.  

The bills totaled some $25,000.  And John B. Cleveland, for whom the science hall was named, paid them all.  With some occasional modifications and renovations, the building continued to be the home of science at Wofford until the early 1960s.  

Those renovations began very quickly.  The building was built with running water and electric lights, but space was soon at a premium.  Students dug out a room under the southeast corner of the first floor in 1910 to build an electrical laboratory.  During the 1930s, using National Youth Administration labor, students with shovels and picks dug out even more space in the basement.   Professor E. H. Shuler, who taught applied math and surveying, supervised the work, which added lab and storage space.  The Spartanburg County Foundation donated a planetarium, which was installed in the dome.  

The occasional coat of paint was about all the college could afford for maintenance, and soon the building was no longer adequate for science education - an annex provided additional classroom space as the student body grew after World War II.  By 1959, with plans to build a new science building underway, the Cleveland Science Hall was demolished.