Brown University Archives - Page 2 of 2

John Hay Library, Brown University, Providence, RI

February 9, 2018November 26, 2016 by Derek Strahan

The John Hay Library at the corner of Prospect and College Streets in Providence, around 1910-1920. Image courtesy of the Library of Congress, Detroit Publishing Company Collection.

The library in 2016:

The John Hay Library is one of several libraries at Brown University. The building was designed by the prominent Boston architectural firm of Shepley, Rutan & Coolidge, and opened in 1910 as the school’s primary library. It was built in part with funds from Andrew Carnegie, and is named for John Hay, an 1858 graduate of Brown who had served as US Secretary of State from 1898 until his death in 1905.

It remained in use as main library until 1964, when the John D. Rockefeller, Jr. Library opened just to the left of here, on the other side of College Street. Today, the John Hay Library is used to house the special collections, rare books, and the University Archives. Among its more unusual holdings are several anthropodermic books, which are books bound in human skin. The library also has an extensive collection of letters and other manuscripts from horror writer H.P. Lovecraft, a Providence native who lived nearby and often visited the library.

Faunce House, Brown University, Providence, RI

February 9, 2018November 23, 2016 by Derek Strahan

Rockefeller Hall, later known as Faunce House, on the campus of Brown University, around 1906. Image courtesy of the Library of Congress, Detroit Publishing Company Collection.

The building in 2016:

This building at Brown University was built in 1904, a few years before the first photo was taken. It was originally named Rockefeller Hall in honor of its benefactor, John D. Rockefeller, Jr. He had graduated from Brown in 1897, and although only 30 when the building was completed, he was already very wealthy thanks to his father’s fortune in Standard Oil. Along with being named for a prominent family, the building was also designed by one of the country’s foremost architects of the era, the New York-based firm of McKim, Mead & White.

When completed, the building had a variety of different uses, including offices for student clubs, a bookstore, a reading room, an assembly hall, and offices for the YMCA. It was expanded in the 1930s, thanks to another donation from Rockefeller, who requested that the building be renamed Faunce Hall, in honor of the late William Faunce. He had been the Rockefeller’s pastor at the Fifth Avenue Baptist Church in New York, and from 1899 to 1929 served as Brown’s president.

Today, the building still bears the name of Faunce, who remains the longest-serving president in the school’s history. Aside from the 1930s addition to the right, not much has changed in its appearance, and it is still in use as a campus center more than 110 years after its completion.

College Green, Brown University, Providence, RI

February 9, 2018November 23, 2016 by Derek Strahan

The College Green at Brown University, around 1906. Image courtesy of the Library of Congress, Detroit Publishing Company Collection.

The scene in 2016:

Brown University is one of the oldest colleges in the United States, and one of the nine that date back to the colonial era. It was established in 1764 as Rhode Island College (or, in its original charter, the slightly wordier name of “the College or University in the English Colony of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations, in New England, in America”). Originally, it was located in the town of Warren, but in 1770 the school moved to its current campus in Providence.

The first building at the new campus is the one in the center of the photo. Known today as University Hall, it opened in 1770, and has served a variety of roles over the years. During the American Revolution, it even housed soldiers prior to the departure for Yorktown near the end of the war. Today, it is used for administrative offices, including the offices of Brown’s president.

On the right side of the photo is the Greek Revival-style Manning Hall, which is another one of the older buildings on the campus. It was completed in 1834 as a library and chapel, and over the years its uses expanded to include a museum, studio, and lecture space. Today, it includes the Haffenreffer Museum of Anthropology as well as the Manning Chapel.

The newest building in this scene is Slater Hall, on the far left. It was built in 1879, making it more than a century newer than its colonial neighbor. It is named for its benefactor, Horatio Nelson Slater, and was designed as a dormitory by the Providence architectural firm of Stone & Carpenter. Today, it remains in use as a dormitory, and like the other two buildings in this scene, very little has changed in its exterior appearance.

John Nicholas Brown Gate, Providence, RI

November 20, 2016 by Derek Strahan

The John Nicholas Brown Gate on George Street, on the campus of Brown University, around 1906. Image courtesy of the Library of Congress, Detroit Publishing Company Collection.

The gate in 2016:

This gate on the south side of the College Green at Brown University is named in honor of John Nicholas Brown I, a member of the prominent Brown family. Not surprisingly, this family played a major role in the establishment and growth of the school, which had been originally founded as Rhode Island College. Not to be confused with the current institution of the same name, this school became Brown University in 1804, in recognition of benefactor Nicholas Brown.

Nicholas’s descendants included his son, John Carter Brown, a book collector who amassed a considerable library of rare history books. After his death in 1874, his son, John Nicholas Brown, inherited the collection, and it later formed the basis of the John Carter Brown Library, located just inside the gate and to the right. The library opened in 1904, four years after John Nicholas Brown’s death.

The library’s opening coincided with the completion of this gate. While the library bore the name of his father, the gate was named for John Nicholas Brown himself, and was a gift of his widow. Their only son, John Nicholas Brown II, who had been just three months old when his father died, participated in the cornerstone laying in December 1903, and the gate opened for the first time five months later. Today, very little has changed in this view; the gate is still there, and the buildings in the background, although hidden by trees, are also still standing.