Names Honor Faculty

Honor will be paid to the first three professors of the Dartmouth faculty in the naming of the college's newest dormitory, President Hopkins announced recently. The home for 175 students which will be ready for occupancy in September is under construction at the south end of the old Bema, east of Fayerweather Row.

The central building of the new dormitory unit will be called Woodward Hall in memory of Bezaleel Woodward, a graduate of Yale in 1764 and Dartmouth professor of Mathematics and Natural Philosophy from 1782-1804. The wings of the new group will be known as Ripley Hall and Smith Hall. Sylvanus Ripley graduated from Dartmouth in 1771 and held the Phillips professorship of Theology from 1782 until his untimely death in 1787. John Smith of the Dartmouth class of 1773 was for more than 30 years professor of Greek, Latin, Hebrew and Oriental languages, holding the position from 1778-1809. In naming the new dormitory group the trustees wished to pay respect to the memory of the three earliest progenitors of the great professorial corps of the present day. In each case the trustees are honoring the memory of a faculty member who devoted his life to teaching in the earliest years of the College. A former vote designating the unit as Benjamin Pomeroy Hall was rescinded.

Woodward, Ripley and Smith are names which are closely related to the first years of Eleazar Wheelock's New Hampshire college. All three carried many duties in addition to their work in instruction. Bezaleel Woodward was the first librarian of the College and also served as treasurer from 1780-1803. In common with Ripley and Smith his first few years on the faculty were spent as a tutor. He was elected a trustee in 1773 and remained on the board during John Wheelock's administration until 1804.

Prof. Sylvanus Ripley was at one time minister of the College Church. He was elected to the board of trustees in 1775 and served until his death, at the age of 38, in 1787.

The Rev. John Smith received the A.M. degree from Harvard and Yale following his graduation from Dartmouth in 1773. He was also given the honorary degree of D.D. by Brown in 1803. Professor Smith was librarian from 1779-1809. He was minister of the church, 1782-1809, and a trustee of the College, 1788-1809.