37. The ATLANTA UNIVERSITY SYSTEM,

occupying three separate areas between Ella and Hunter Sts., SW., includes Atlanta University, Morehouse College, Spelman College, and the Atlanta School of Social Work. These schools, though occupying virtually adjoining campuses and doing work of much the game general nature, were originally separate institutions. By an affiliation in 1929 Morehouse became the liberal arts school for men and Spelman for women, while Atlanta University was made the graduate school. In 1938 the Atlanta School of Social Work, the only exclusively Negro institution of its kind, also became an affiliate. The reorganization has voided much duplication of work, reduced administrative and faculty costs, raised the standard of the individual schools, and extended co-operation to other leading Negro colleges in the city.

Each institution in the system has a separate board of trustees, the chairmen of these bodies forming the controlling board of the whole. In addition to the four main institutions, there are a nursery and a laboratory school covering the grades from kindergarten through high school. Thus the system provides a complete education from the nursery through professional and graduate work with a master's degree.

Total enrollment under the Atlanta University System varies between 1,500 and 2,000. The endowments of the several colleges, along with their 31 buildings and 91 acres of land, represent an investment of $10,000,000.

Atlanta University, covering two separate blocks on Chestnut St. between Greensferry Ave. and Hunter St., is situated on a campus designed along formal lines with smooth expanses of lawn and angular walkways bordered by straight rows of elms and water oaks. Since Atlanta University is the graduate school of the system, its enrollment is rather small, usually numbering about 100 students.

The institution grew out of a small school established in 1865 for freed slaves, the first quarters being the Jenkins Street Church and the "Car Box," a railroad car purchased in Chattanooga and brought to Atlanta for this purpose. Edmund Asa Ware, who came to Atlanta in 1866 under the auspices of the American Missionary Association, aroused interest in the institution and secured $25,000 from the association for enlarging it. The school was chartered as Atlanta University in 1867 and was moved two years later to a 50-acre tract bounded by Walnut, Tatnall, Hunter, Beckwith, and Chestnut Streets. Under the leadership of Ware, the first president, the school was remarkably successful.

After its affiliation with Morehouse and Spelman in 1929, Atlanta University acquired a portion of the Morehouse grounds for a central campus and erected there a new administration building, opened in 1932. On the western end of the older campus, two dormitories and a dining hall, the million-dollar gift of an anonymous donor, were completed in 1933.

The Atlanta University Library (open weekdays 9:30-9:30), corner Chestnut St. and Greensferry Ave., is a red-brick-and-limestone structure in the classic tradition and is surmounted with a graceful cupola. Erected in 1932 through donations of the General Education Board of the Rockefeller Foundation, the library has served as a model for the construction of similar institutions throughout the country. The building was erected on the Atlanta University campus with the stipulation that it was to be used by all other Negro institutions of higher education in the city. The stacks now contain 6o,ooo volumes with additional space for twice that number.

The Atlanta University Administration Building, 223 Chestnut St., is a brick and limestone edifice of Georgian Colonial design. Both the front and rear have columned porticoes, and on the roof is a cupola topped with a gilded dome. The building, completed in 1932, houses seminar rooms, a conference chamber, administration offices, and a commissary.

The Atlanta School of Social Work, Chestnut St, between the library and administration building, is a red-brick structure with a simple, Doric-columned portico surmounted with an ornamental grille balustrade. For several years after its organization in 1920, the school borrowed classrooms and office space, as well as the part-time services of a professor of sociology, from Morehouse College. In 1925 an appropriation from the Laura Spelman Rockefeller Memorial made it possible for the school to function as an independent institution in rented quarters.

In addition to training Negroes for the profession of social work, the school has also become recognized as a promotional agency for welfare work among Negroes throughout the South. Some of this work has developed through the school's extracurricular activities, while other services have been rendered through the medium of studies and surveys made by the students under the supervision of the research department. The faculty is constantly called upon to consult with executives of public and private social agencies on questions involving social planning for the entire community. Special projects in which the school has participated include a tuberculosis institute, a WPA old age survey, a WPA population study, a regional conference of student health workers, and a summer camp for Negro children. Because of its high scholastic standards the institution is today the only Negro member of the American Association of Schools of Social Work. Enrollment numbers about 100 students.

Morehouse College, covering 12 acres adjoining the main campus of Atlanta University, is composed of the college of arts and sciences and the school of religion. The two are housed in seven red-brick buildings and have an enrollment of more than 400 students.

Morehouse was organized in Augusta in 1867 as the Augusta Institute by the American Baptist Home Mission Society. In recognition of Atlanta's growing importance as a Negro educational center, the school was moved to the city in 1879 and renamed the Atlanta Baptist Seminary. In 1897 it became known as the Atlanta Baptist College, and in 1913 the name was changed again to Morehouse College in honor of the Reverend Henry L. Morehouse, who was then corresponding secretary of the mission society and a prominent benefactor of the Negro race. From 1906 to 1931 Morehouse had as its president Dr. John Hope, an outstanding Negro educator and leader, who also became president of the entire university system when it was organized in 1929.

Spelman College, bounded by Ella St., Leonard St., Greensferry Ave., and Culver St., occupies a campus of 25 acres with 14 brick buildings grouped about a quadrangle. The level greensward, densely shadowed by magnolias, is particularly beautiful in spring when the oaks, elms, and weeping willows are in full leaf.

Spelman College was founded in 1881 by two New England women, Sophia B. Packard and Harriett Giles. Miss Packard, sent by the Women's American Baptist Home Mission Society to study the conditions in the South, was impressed by the need for education among Negro women. She solicited the aid of Miss Giles, and, with $100 provided by the Mission Society, the two opened a school in the basement of Friendship Baptist Church, using even the coal bins as classrooms.

Just prior to the opening of the second term, Miss Packard and Miss Giles went North to secure additional funds for the school. In Cleveland, Ohio, they spoke in a church of which John D. Rockefeller was a member. Rockefeller was present, and, in keeping with his custom, he put every cent he had in his pockets into the collection plate. Then he approached Miss Packard. "Are you going to stick?" he asked the astonished lady. He went on to explain, "You know, there are so many who come here and present their work and get us to give money. Soon they are gone and we don't know where they are or where their work is. Do you mean to stick? If you do, you will hear from me again."

Back in Atlanta, Miss Packard set about looking for a new location for the school. The American Baptist Home Mission Society had secured an option on the present property, which had been used as barracks and drill grounds for Federal troops after the War between the States. This they transferred to Miss Packard on condition that she raise the balance due of $15,000.

With little money but unbounded faith, Miss Packard moved the school to the five frame buildings on the new site in February 1883. Her faith was justified. The enrollment increased rapidly and teachers volunteered their services, while missionary societies and other groups and individuals in the North sent gifts of clothing and supplies. The Negro Baptists of Georgia gave $3,000, and other Negro friends raised $1,300 more. Even after the time for payment had been extended twice, however, less than half the needed funds had been raised.

In April 1884, Mr. and Mrs. John D. Rockefeller, their two children, and Mrs. Rockefeller's mother and sister visited the school. So favorably impressed were they with the work of the institution that Rockefeller immediately gave enough money to clear the title to the property and to provide additional facilities. Miss Packard thereupon changed the name of the school from the Atlanta Baptist FemaleSeminary to Spelman Seminary in honor of Mrs. Lucy Henry Spelman, the mother of Mrs. Rockefeller.

With the aid of Rockefeller and other individuals and groups, Spelman expanded greatly. At the time of Miss Packard's death in 1891, the school had 800 pupils. As the city system of public education for Negroes grew, however, Spelman gradually eliminated its elementary classes in order that the resources of the institution might be concentrated on college work. The student enrollment of Spelman College today is about 375.

Rockefeller Hall, on the east side of the Quadrangle, the first permanent building of the school, was erected in 1886 from funds donated by Rockefeller during his visit in 1884. Formerly a chapel and dormitory, the building is now used for administrative purposes. The assembly room on the second floor has been converted into a theater for the school of dramatics. This building is probably better known to the white people of Atlanta than any other on the campus for many plays, ranging from Greek tragedy to modern high comedy, are presented to the public here.

Sisters Chapel, near the Ella St. entrance, is a red-brick building patterned along classic lines. Six large Doric columns support a massive entablature and a severely plain pediment. Erected in 1926 and named in honor of the mother of John D. Rockefeller and her sister, the building has a seating capacity of 1,500 and is used for concerts, commencement exercises, and daily chapel services.

The Spelman Nursery School, occupying a half-timbered brick structure on a triangular block east of the Ella St. campus entrance, provides modern training for approximately 100 children of preschool age. The youngest children, from 18 months to 3 years, have separate facilities for games, lunches, and naps. The older children are furnished with equipment for such constructive work as modeling, block-building, drawing, painting, paper-cutting, and woodworking. Adequate indoor play rooms are available for use in inclement weather, and there are spacious, well-ventilated sleeping rooms as well as large porches for sun-bathing. The older children have access to a well-equipped library and are given special training in language, music, story-telling, and dancing.

The parent education program operated in conjunction with the work of the school gives parents the opportunity of co-ordinating training techniques used in the school with those used in the home.

Morris Brown College, Tatnall and Hunter Sts., NW., occupies four of the old red-brick buildings and a portion of the campus that formerly were used by Atlanta University. Essentially a liberal arts college, it is controlled by the African Methodist Episcopal Church and has a strong theological department called the Turner Theological Seminary. Approximately 500 Negro men and women are annually enrolled at the institution.

Morris Brown is not a unit of the Atlanta University System but is one of three institutions that co-operate with the larger organization, the other two being Clark College and Gammon Theological Seminary. The colleges have a plan of mutual assistance, whereby the Atlanta University Library is open to all their students, a combined summer session is held, and teachers are exchanged. Junior and senior students of one college may register for courses at the other institutions.

The movement to found Morris Brown was begun at Big Bethel Church in 1881, when the North Georgia Annual Conference of the African Methodist Episcopal Church passed a resolution to establish a school in Atlanta. It was not until 1885, however, that a charter was secured and that the institution was opened on a lot at the corner of Houston Street and Boulevard. The school was named to honor Morris Brown, a bishop of the African Methodist Episcopal Church. Only high school courses were offered for several years, but in 1894 the trustees organized the liberal arts college and established the department of theology. The institution has since maintained a continuous growth. In 1932 the preparatory school was abolished, the Williams Business College was made the commercial department, and the school was moved to its present location.

Clark College, 240 Chestnut St., SW., occupies four modern red-brick buildings with limestone trim. The school, a member of the Association of American Colleges and the American Council on Education, has been rated Class A by the Southern Association. It is authorized to confer on Negro men and women the Bachelor of Arts and Bachelor of Science degrees. An endowment of $550,000 enables the college to maintain low tuition charges and to extend opportunities to deserving students. For the school year of 1940-41 the enrollment was more than 400, including the students registered in evening classes. With courses in literature, languages, natural sciences, mathematics, social sciences, and the arts, the curriculum lays emphasis on both academic and practical aspects of liberal arts training. The department of business administration places particular stress on adaptation of the student to employment in Southern commercial enterprises, while the department of home economics, aided by the Woman's Home Missionary Society, provides courses in all aspects of domestic science. The department of music presents choral performances for public entertainments as well as for the regular chapel exercises.

Like many other such institutions, Clark first opened as the result of the enthusiasm for Negro improvement felt by Northern educators and philanthropists in the years following emancipation. The college is the outgrowth of a primary school for Negro children opened early in 1869 by the Reverend J.W. Lee and his wife in Clark Chapel on Fraser Street. In the following year this small institution was acquired by the Freedmen's Aid Society of the Methodist Episcopal Church, which was doing extensive missionary work among the Southern Negroes. Then began a period of rapid development. In 1872 better quarters were secured at Whitehall and McDaniel Streets, and in 1877 a charter was granted to elevate the school to the status of a university. The enlarged institution was named in honor of Bishop D.W. Clark, who had been a strong friend of the Negro race during his period of service in the South. Bishop Gilbert Haven, an abolitionist clergyman who had become interested in the school during his official residence in Atlanta, worked energetically to raise subscriptions throughout the United States and purchased between 400 and 500 acres for a new site at McDonough Road and Capitol Avenue. The first building was erected in 1880 and in the following year was used both as recitation hall and dormitory. In 1883 Elijah H. Gammon endowed a chair of theology at Clark, and five years later this department was chartered as the Gammon Theological Seminary, a separate institution occupying an adjacent campus and co-operating closely with the older school.

Through the generosity of various benefactors the institution continued to grow. For many years emphasis was placed on the teaching of trades, but gradually this work was supplanted by courses in the liberal arts. The academic work was further strengthened in 1941 when the school was moved to the education center that has developed around Atlanta University.

The name was changed to Clark College in 1940. Removal to its present site was made possible by donations from the General Education Board, the Rosenwald Foundation, and Mrs. Henry Pfeiffer of New York. These changes have not affected the separate status of the institution. In its new location the school can more easily share in the combined facilities of all the Negro colleges grouped around Atlanta University. Through co-operative arrangement Clark offers courses in physics to students of all the colleges in this center, and, in turn, Clark students register for the courses emphasized in the other colleges.

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