University of Virginia

“ Like Monticello, the buildings of the University of Virginia are those of an intellectual, a classicist, a purist, and, like it, they might have been austere but for the warmth of their red brick and the glow of their white-columned porticos. But they are cheerful buildings, which, individually and as a group, attain a geometrical yet soft perfection, a supreme harmony of form and color.
The principal buildings are grouped about a large campus, called the Lawn, which is dominated by the rotunda, suggesting in its outlines the Pantheon at Rome. ”

“ The University of Virginia holds its own, notwithstanding the desolation wrought by the late civil war, and Ann Arbor and Cornell have shot up with extraordinary vigor. There can be no doubt that our institutions of learning are full of robust life. And it is no less certain that this growth of resources is due to private enterprise. Our colleges have grown because graduates, and even non-graduates, have taken an interest in them, and endowed them with a munificence which seems incredible to a Frenchman or a German. ”

“ The three experienced educators are elected quadrennially by the Senate from a list of eligibles consisting of one from each of the faculties and nominated by the respective boards of visitors or trustees of the University of Virginia, the Virginia Military Institute, the Virginia Polytechnic Institute, the State Female Normal School at Danville, the School for the Deaf and Blind, and also of the College of William and Mary so long as the State continues its annual appropriation to the last-named institution. ”

“ Thomas Jefferson, Founder of the University of Virginia. Virginia long maintained its position as the university of the south, being its home of scholarship and school of training for public life. Perhaps no other institution in the country prepared so many men for high official positions ”

“ No less important, the University of Virginia was the first college to introduce (1842) the honor system, and still has the most complete honor system to be found among American colleges. This system is an outgrowth of the Jeffersonian idea of student self-government; under it each student signs, with examination papers, a pledge that he has neither given nor received assistance. That is found sufficient; students are not watched, nor need they be. ”

“ The University of Virginia, early in its history, attracted foreign teachers, who were all young men.
We shall hope to secure a strong staff of young men, appointing them because they have twenty years before them; selecting them on evidence of their ability; increasing constantly their emoluments, and promoting them because of their merit to successive posts, as scholars, fellows, assistants, adjuncts, professors and university professors. ”

“ Seventeen years later a Society of Alumni was organized at the University of Virginia, where, with perhaps a characteristic Southern emphasis on the social side of human relationships, the committee was instructed,—
to invite the alumni to form a permanent society, to offer to graduates an inducement to revisit the seat of their youthful studies and to give new life to disinterested friendships found in student days. ”

“ The existence of the University of Virginia is scarcely recognised by British travellers. I was welcomed there as the first who had ever visited it. Charlottesville lies out of the ordinary route of tourists; but Monticello, the seat of Jefferson, is within sight of his favourite institution, and Mr. Madison's residence is only about thirty-five miles off; and it seems surprising that such a combination of interesting objects should not have drawn more pilgrim feet that way. ”

“ The valuable stores to be drawn from these, especially from the French and German, are, of themselves, attractions which render unnecessary collegiate restraint or recommendation. No one can now be esteemed well educated, who is thoroughly ignorant of them.
It has been remarked that the student is permitted, in the University of Virginia, to graduate in the separate schools; and that an evil exists there, in no course of study being advised. ”

“ Henrico University was the first attempt in Virginia at an institution for higher learning. The Indian Massacre of 1622 ruined these conscientious efforts. The [196] first two colleges actually founded in Virginia were William and Mary College at Williamsburg founded in 1693—the second oldest college in the thirteen original colonies—and Washington and Lee University at Lexington founded in 1749. ”

“ Concentrated attention on the proposed University and, particularly, the College began in 1619 although there is evidence that Argall, when Governor, did some work in this direction. Specific evidence of interest toward Christianizing the Indians and educating the "infidels children" in Virginia is easy to find in the literature and records of the period. Yeardley's instructions in 1618 carried the order to locate a suitable place for a university in the Henrico area. ”

“ Rockfish and Shenandoah valleys. You will probably agree with the statement when you stand where you may get a commanding view of the country below you. The large home on the estate is now a country club. Nearby is the site of "Old Mountain Top Tavern," widely known years ago for its fine hospitality. A group met at the tavern in 1818 to decide the location of the proposed University of Virginia. Among them were Madison, Monroe, Marshall and Jefferson.
Driving along the roads you see some of the finest peach orchards in Virginia, for the section is famed for its high quality fruit. ”

“ The said young men shall, each sign an engagement to teach as private tutors, in some school or academy of this State for the term of two years, after leaving the University, in consideration of the education there received.”
The Act of March 8, 1842, and of March 12, 1856, brought out the full influence of the two State institutions to the important duty of providing teachers for the schools of Virginia. ”

“ Alfred Leyburn, did the author of ‘Civis’ the honor of applying to him for a name of the proposed school. The present name, Virginia Military Institute, was furnished and adopted; it seemed appropriately significant: Virginia — as a State institution, neither sectional nor denominational. Military—indicating its characteristic feature — Institute — as something different from either college or university. ”

“ Three-fourths of a century have passed since Washington, Jefferson and Adams consulted together concerning the National University of the future. Alas! it is still of the future. The dream of its fulfillment was dearer to the father of his country, probably, than to any other mortal. The explicit provision made for it in his will proves this. That bequest went finally, I believe, to a college in Virginia. Columbia College, feeble, small and old, is the nearest approach to the National University of which the National Capital can boast to-day. ”

“ Virginia has always rightly prided herself upon the character of the men whom she has sent into public life. No more wonderful example of governmental ability, ability in statecraft and public administration, has ever been given than by the history of Virginia’s sons in public life. I feel that this University, [455] which so peculiarly embodies the ideal of Virginia, is in no small degree accountable for the happy keeping up of the spirit which sends into public life men of whom their constituents exact that they shall possess both courage and courtesy ”

“ Live, not that you may have your name in Washington with a big pension or something of that kind, but in order that you may contribute to the betterment of the environment of those about you.'
"To the students before him he said he would recommend the whole world and the universe as a university in which to learn and in which to strive to ascend to the university of the most high God. ”

“ Van Every, Dale. A COMPANY OF HEROES: THE AMERICAN FRONTIER, 1775-1783. William Morrow Company, New York, New York, 1962.
Van Schreeven, William J., and Scribner, Robert L. REVOLUTIONARY VIRGINIA: THE ROAD TO INDEPENDENCE, VOLUME I, 1763-1774, Volume II, 1773-75, Volume III, 1775. Virginia Independence Bicentennial Commission, University Press of Virginia, Charlottesville, Virginia, 1973, 1974, 1975. ”