In addition to the current campus first established west of Lancaster city in the early 1850s, Franklin & Marshall College has purchased or owned many off-campus properties. One of the earliest, but lesser known, properties was a large burial plot in Lancaster Cemetery. Today the plot includes the graves of several College presidents and other College-affiliated persons as well as a monument to one president that was once a prominent feature on campus.
choose Comments for more....
1 comment:
more Plot...
The German Reformed Church established Lancaster Cemetery in December 1846 after their churchyard burial lot on Orange Street became filled. The Church purchased 10 acres of land along New Holland Pike at (what was then) the outskirts of town from parishioner David Longenecker. In the early 1850s an event occurred that prompted the College to buy what was most likely its first off-campus property.
After the consolidation of Franklin and Marshall Colleges in Lancaster and subsequent sale of the Marshall College property in 1853 the alumni of Marshall College began discussing the possibility of moving the remains of its revered first president, Dr. Frederick A. Rauch (1806-1841), from the grounds of Marshall College in Mercersburg to Lancaster. Although marked by a handsome monument, Rauch's grave had essentially been abandoned and it was feared it would become unkempt. This prompted a committee of Marshall College alumni in July 1855 to formally urge the removal of Rauch’s grave.
Urged by the Marshall alumni, the Franklin & Marshall College Board of Trustees instructed the Executive Committee on July 22, 1856 to purchase a lot in Lancaster Cemetery. It took several more years until the remains of Dr. Rauch were reinterred in Lancaster Cemetery on March 8, 1859, after an appropriate ceremony and eulogy read by John Williamson Nevin. Dr. Rauch remained the sole occupant of the College plot until 1870 when the Rev. Bernard Clause Wolff (1794-1870), a longtime supporter of F&M, was laid to rest.
Meanwhile on campus, the Reformed Synod, and the Marshall College and Franklin & Marshall College Alumni Associations, sought to further honor Rauch’s memory by erecting a large monument or cenotaph in front of Goethean Hall.
Approved on January 3, 1871 by the Board of Trustees and dedicated on June 28, the monument stood 15 feet tall when placed on a landscaped mound in front of Goethean Hall. Named after Rauch’s fellow German philosopher, Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, the choice of Goethean Hall was apparently not coincidental. Sculpted by York artist Davoust Kern, the monument was distinguished by crisp relief–sculpted detail symbolizing Rauch, who is depicted wearing classical garb, and holding the bible in his lap while surrounded by the lamp of knowledge and classical and philosophical texts by authors such as Aristotle, Descartes, Plato and Kant. An overturned hourglass lies on the floor, most likely symbolizing Rauch’s short life. Perhaps most striking is Rauch’s foot placed over the work of Francis Bacon, which he seems to reject.
The monument occupied the site until 1892 when it was moved to Rauch's gravesite in Lancaster Cemetery, where it remains today as a badly deteriorated marker. Why the monument was moved off campus is not recorded. Various campus improvements were being made at the time but nothing that would have necessitated moving the monument. Perhaps it was felt that the monument would be more appropriate as Rauch’s grave marker or that it was just time to move on as the College modernized.
—Michael Lear, Archives and Special Collections Assistant
BOX SIDEBAR
After Wolff’s burial in the College plot in Lancaster Cemetery, other members of his family were interred nearby. In 1892 the Board of Trustees granted Wolff’s daughter Mrs. Theodore Appel the exclusive right of burial for members of her family in the western part of the college plot “for a modest consideration.” Appel family members buried there include: Mrs. Appel (Susan Burton Wolff Appel, 1827-1900), her husband Theodore Appel (1823-1907), a member of the faculty of Franklin & Marshall College from 1853-1877; their children; and James Z. Appel (1907-1981), College physician from 1943-1971. On the eastern edge of the F&M plot lies: F&M’s first president Emanuel Vogel Gerhart (1817-1904, president 1855-1866); F&M president Thomas Gilmore Apple (1829-1898, president 1877-1889) and his wife Emma; Professor of Greek and College librarian John B. Kieffer (1839-1910) and his wife, Lalla; and Japanese alumnus George Kinzo Kaneko, F&M 1891 (1865-1895).
Post a Comment