Tag Archives: Nicholas Brown

p. 32 – Administration, setting, and staff, 1820-1833

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the Annual Meeting. Appropriately enough, Stephen Gano, of Providence, at the request of the Executive Committee and on the strong recommendation of Nicholas Brown, gave the sermon, preaching from Isaiah, XXIX, 11, 12, “And the vision of all is become to you as the words of a book that is sealed….” His massive form, majestic appearance and powerful melodious voice held the attention of his hearers. Hascall, who followed him with an address “embracing a view of the providence of God which had conducted the Institution to its present elevation,” must have felt triumphant and at the same time humble as he related what had been achieved. Choral music of a “superior style” was interspersed throughout the program. A spirit of thanksgiving and devotion pervaded the audience as they realized what Hascall and his co-workers had accomplished. At noon members  of the Education Society attended a dinner provided for them by the Executive Committee and in the afternoon were present at a meeting of the newly formed Society of Alumni and Friends, at which Gerrit Smith, the First Vice President, presided.

Commencement the next day tested the strength and seating capacity of the chapel. It was estimated that between two and three thousand people ‘packed themselves in for the occasion. Since the floors held, there was no fear of their giving way in the future. One observer described the room as follows:

The chapel occupies part of the third and fourth stories, with an arched ceiling similar to a well furnished meeting house. The whole of the  fourth story is embraced in the chapel, and forms the gallery except about twenty feet on the west end, which is appropriated to rooms. The center room about twenty feet square, is designed for philosophical apparatus, and opens by folding doors on to the stage, or west gallery of the chapel, and forms, when opened, an admirable platform for the trustees and faculty to occupy at commencement. That part of the gallery appropriated to the stage is about 8 feet wide perhaps, and  is finished with a railing in front, and commands a full view of the audience in the galleries, and also in the pit. That part of the chapel, which we call the pits the area between the galleries formed by a continuation of the panels, or walls in front of the galleries, down to the floor of the third story, excluding all that part of the third story under the galleries. This pit has seats ascending, with a platform and  desk at one end, sufficiently large for all ordinary occasions of worship. It strikes one as templum in templo.*

* New York Baptist Register, June 16, 1827.

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p. 29 – Administration, setting, and staff, 1820-1833

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Mrs. Samuel Payne, A0999-3, p29

Deacon Payne seems to have acquired a moderate amount of wealth in agriculture. He took a rather active part in the political life of the county and twice sat in the State Assembly. He belonged to the conservative wing of the Democratic-Republican party and, his solid figure and dignified presence must have been well known at caucuses and conventions. For many years he ‘was a Justice of the Peace and in 1832 a Presidential Elector. Mrs. Payne, a kind and pious woman, who made her home a place where the young men of the Institution could find understanding and cheer, was known as “the Students’ Mother.” In the early years before rooms were available in the “building on the plain,” students lived with the Paynes. Without children of their own, they gave to the school the love and affection they would normally have bestowed on a family.

The choice of a site for the new building, now to be on the Payne farm, the Executive Committee referred to a committee of six. Hascall, whose plan for the structure they had already approved, served as a member. He had represented the Institution at a meeting of the Board of the now auxiliary New York Baptist Theological Seminary in New York City whose members raised $2,000 by their own efforts for the building and later, when additional funds were needed, borrowed $1,000 more at 7 percent interest.

A gift of $1,000 from Nicholas Brown proved another important addition to the building fund. Brown’s pastor, the Rev. Stephen Gano of the First Baptist Church of Providence, Rhode Island, returned from a visit to Hamilton in 1825 enthusiastic about the Seminary and

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p. 27 – Administration, setting, and staff, 1820-1833

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enclosed on three sides with a fence of oak posts and hemlock boards. Subsequently the Trustees bought about four and a half acres adjoining the yard “for cultivation by the students and for building lots.”

No plans or descriptions of the interior exist but it is certain that the building was used both for classrooms and as a dormitory. Accommodations at the time of opening were ample since they were designed for forty students and only about thirty were registered. Seniors had rooms on the third and second floors, the “middle class” on the second, and juniors” on the first. As a means of encouraging donations for outfitting student rooms the Executive Committee agreed that any individual or group providing furniture worth $50.00 might give a name to the room. Articles contributed included chairs, tables, cots, candlesticks, snuffers, pitchers, sheets, pillow-cases, blankets, towels, shovels, tongs, brooms, and “save-alls.” The congregation of the “South Baptist Meeting House,” New York City, asked that the room they furnished be named for their pastor, Charles G. Sommers, who had been the first young man aided by the New York Baptist Theological Seminary. They also requested that it be occupied by Norman Bentley and Seth Smalley, both of the Class of 1826.

Only two years after the completion of the “stone academy,” enrollment had jumped to fifty. At a special meeting of the Board in August, 1825, called to discuss the overcrowding, the Trustees agreed that another building was needed and directed the Executive Committee and the agents to take measures for its erection “without interfering with the funds of the Society.” Perhaps the Board had in its mind Deacon Colgate, Gerrit Smith, or Nicholas Brown, the wealthy Baptist merchant of Providence, Rhode Island, when they further resolved that any person making a donation equal to the cost of a new building might select a name for it. At the request of the Executive Committee, Daniel Hascall prepared and presented a plan for a four-story structure, 100 feet long and 60 feet wide, to be completed in two years ‘at a cost of $6,500. His plan was accepted.

There is no evidence to show where the proposed building was to be placed though there is reason to believe it was to have been located near the “stone academy.” However, the Trustees may have had a different idea, for at a special meeting in February, 1826, they appointed Jonathan Olmstead, Seneca B. Burchard, and Samuel Payne “to enquire into the propriety of purchasing a farm to be

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