Special Collections Staff Picks

Source: Thomas A. Person Papers, Manuscript Collection #303

Staff Person: Maury York

Description:

This promotional brochure describes changes that were taking place at Louisburg College in Louisburg, N.C. The college had opened in 1857 to educate young women. A fire in 1928 seriously damaged the handsome Greek Revival Main Building, and the Great Depression curtailed enrollment, causing the college to incur significant debt. In response to this crisis, in 1931 the college admitted young men for the first time. Enrollment increased significantly. In this optimistic description of the “new” college, Isabelle Ziegler, a teacher of foreign languages, offered her view of the spirit of the institution: “Spirit at Louisburg College is that Something which with one gusty effort has blown away forever all the dust and death of the ages and has filled the lungs of this old College with the clear, cold, glorious atmosphere of the heights, which has given these two hundred young men and women the mental, spiritual and physical energy to seize this old world and carry it on their shoulders with Homeric laughter to the very heights.”

Posted by Maury York under East Carolina Manuscript Collection, advertisements, pamphlets and Tags: education, Louisburg College