Contents of this Article:

• Washington College — Page 1
• Greenville College — Page 2
• Tusculum College — Page 3
• Vaughn Memorial Academy, Swift Memorial Seminary, Rittenhouse Academy, Grassy Cove Academy, Beech Academy, Huntsville Academy — Page 4
• New Market Academy, Davies Academy, The Home Industrial School for Girls, The Jeroldstown Academy — Page 5

Greenville College

The founder of this institution was the Rev. Hezekiah Balch, D. D., who had graduated at Princeton College, N. J., and having first engaged in preaching and teaching on the Atlantic slope, removed to Greene county, Tenn., about 1780, and became permanently settled over Mount Bethel Church at Greeneville in 1783. Soon afterward he resolved to found a Literary Institution on a plantation which he had purchased and on which he had fixed his own residence, on Richland creek, about three miles south of Greeneville.

On the 3d of September, 1794, he obtained a charter from the General Assembly of the Territory of the United States South of the Ohio River, establishing what was known as Greeneville College, and appointed Mr. Balch to be its first president.

At the first meeting of the board of trustees, held in the house of James Stinson, in the town of Greeneville, February 18, 1795, the Rev. Robert Henderson was elected secretary of the board.

They also adopted a memorial to the President and the Congress of the United States, for aid in their enterprise. In the same year, Mr. Balch made a tour to Philadelphia and through the New England States, and collected $1350 in cash; $350 in subscriptions, and a large number of books.

On the 16th of August, 1796, a building committee was instructed to contract for erecting a college building on a site selected near the residence of Mr. Balch – the building to be a frame, 32 feet by 26 feet, and two stories high, with a chimney stack at each end.

The record of the doings of the trustees from 1796 to 1800, was lost without being transcribed by the secretary.

The next meeting of the trustees on record was held March 3, 1800. At a meeting, January 9, 1801, they elected the Rev. Charles Coffin as their vice-president in the room of Mr. Henderson, resigned.

Mr. Coffin, a native of Newburyport, Mass., graduated at Harvard College in 1793. After being licensed by the Essex Association, he made a tour southward for the benefit of his health, and visited Greeneville at this time (1800), and afterward became permanently identified with the institution, which owed not less to him than to the founder himself.

Mr. Coffin, was immediately commissioned as a financial agent, for the house was yet unfinished and there is no evidence that the College was yet opened. The hindrance was no doubt in a want of funds. It appears from the record that the College was opened October 28, 1802. In 1803, the trustees authorized the president to have the windows glazed and the house prepared for the comfort of students. Mr. Coffin had sent forms and lists for subscriptions from the Northern States to stimulate subscription in the home field. When he had spent four years mainly in the East, South and West, on the financial agency, he reported $14,000 collected, of which $8000 were from beyond the mountains. He had also obtained a large addition to the library and apparatus.

This report of agency was made in 1805, when a serious difficulty arose in regard to making it a condition to the use of these funds that the trustees should adopt a rule that no man should be admitted into the College as an instructor, who would not adopt a certain system of doctrines, usually known as Hopkinsian, which many of the New England donors had embraced.

At first the trustees, by a large majority, rejected the condition; but afterward a compromise was made, and the rule adopted in view of a modified statement of the doctrines, and the donations were accepted. Of the sum collected, $6550 were invested in United States stocks bearing eight per cent interest. The building being now finished, and the income of investments being available for the support of the professors, the College became encouragingly prosperous. The first recorded “Bachelor of Arts,” Hugh Brown, was graduated in 1808.

It is remarkable that the records of the board of trustees, extending over upwards of forty years, are entirely silent on the subject of graduations, excepting in three or four cases, so that it is impossible from them to learn who, and how many were the alumni; though it is known from other sources that a considerable number did graduate subsequently to 1808, during the administrations of Presidents Balch and Coffin and some at a later date. Whether any record was kept separately by the faculty, of examinations and conferring degrees, is unknown.

Dr. Hezekiah Balch, the founder and first president of Greeneville College, died in April, 1810, and the 27th of April following, the Rev. Charles Coffin was elected to succeed him by a unanimous vote of the trustees, as one eminently qualified for that position.

In 1818, President Coffin, as financial agent, collected $3162 cash, and obtained $227 on subscription. At other times also he obtained considerable sums, so that personally he obtained upwards of $20,000, by personal efforts, a large part of which was invested and yielded a considerable amount for the support of the instructors. The last of his tours to the East was in the summer of 1822. On his return, he received the thanks of the board for “his patriotic exertions on behalf of the College.” In this year, a two-story brick boarding house was erected on the college grounds.

The Rev. Oramel Hinckley, and after him the Rev. Stephen Foster, filled the chair of mathematics and natural philosophy, in connection with Dr. Coffin.

In 1827, there seems, from the records, to have been factional movements connected with the board of trustees, unpleasant to Dr. Coffin, and he having been elected, by the Legislature, president of East Tennessee College at Knoxville, resigned the presidency of Greeneville College, April 23, 1827, and accepted the other position.

This was a loss from which Greeneville College never recovered to the enjoyment of any considerable prosperity. It would be tedious and uninteresting to detail the changes connected with its struggles, decline and final extinction.

It no longer enjoyed the former public favor and confidence; its efforts to obtain funds were various but generally unsuccessful, and instead of retaining the investments had has supported the instructors, first the dividends and afterwards the principal began to be used for repairs and other expenses, until no proper faculty could be employed or sustained in the institution.

Mr. Henry Hoss, of Greene county, succeeded Dr. Coffin in 1828, and presided until his death in 1836. In 1838, Rev. James McLin, formerly president of Washington College, was elected successor to Mr. Hoss.

In 1839, the school was removed to the Rhea Academy building in Greeneville, and a committee appointed to secure a lot and to erect a new college building in the same town. In 1840, Mr. Valentine Sevier offered the donation of a lot, which was accepted by the trustees as the site. A building committee and agents to collect funds for erecting the edifice were appointed. But these agents had little success, and the building was erected by selling what remained of the investment in the Union Bank of Maryland, in Baltimore. This building was of brick and stood on the ground now occupied by the residence of Mr. Naff, on the north-east border of the town of Greeneville, and was built by by Joseph D. Price for $3025. It was opened for instruction on the 16th of October, 1843. In the meantime President McLin resigned, in 1840, and his successors were Rev. Samuel Mathews, 1843-45; Rev. Charles A. Van Vleck, one year, 1846; Rev. John J. Fleming, one year, 1847. During the years 1847-1854 there occurred a vacancy in which the building was neglected and many of the books and pieces of apparatus were carried off. In 1854, the Trustees made some repairs, and elected the Rev. William B. Rankin President, with whom they associated as Professor of Mathematics, etc., in 1855, the Rev. A. J. Brown, of Blountville. The latter resigned in 1857, and Mr. S. V. McCorkle was employed in his room with President Rankin, one year, 1858.

Under President Rankin there was a temporary revival of interest and efficiency. In 1855-56, the tuition fees amounted to $882; in 1857-58, to $782. In each of these years there were two graduates.

There is no record of any meeting of the Board of Trustees from June 26, 1858 to 1863, when they met and ordered that the remainder of the library be saved from loss by being removed to the second story of the storehouse of Messrs. Park & Brown.

On January 16, 1868, the Board of Trustees appointed a committee to negotiate with similar committee of the Trustees of Tusculum College, which resulted in the consolidation of the two institutions, in the same year, under the title of “Greeneville and Tusculum College.” The site and college building were sold for $700, and the remnant of the library was removed to Tusculum.