Hathorn Hall, Bates College
Bates College campus, Lewiston, MEBates College was incorporated as the Maine State Seminary in 1856. Originally the Parsonfield Academy, Parsonfield, the college was founded by Free Baptists under a charter providing that it should be free from denominational control, yet that education and religion should be inseparably connected. The location of the college was disputed by other towns, but Lewiston's central location and subscriptions by local businessmen towards the building fund won the distinction. A college course was instituted in 1863 and the seminary's name was changed in honor of Benjamin E. Bates of Boston. Bates was one of the first New England colleges to become co-educational, and in 1907 it became one of the associated colleges in the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching. Bates is first among New England colleges in the number of its graduates who are principals of New England secondary schools.
The first building of the Maine State Seminary was Hathorn Hall completed in July of 1857 and named in honor of Seth and Mary Hathorn, the principal donors in the fundraising drives.
The first class at the Maine State Seminary consisted of 83 gentlemen and 54 ladies. The doors opened on September 1, 1857. Enrollment increased to 353 in the second year.
For the first six years of its existence, Hathorn Hall was used by the Seminary as a library, chapel, lecture rooms, and office building; then, until August 1869, jointly with Bates College (which was chartered in January 1864) Thereafter the seminary department became preparatory to the College, culminating in the Nichols Latin School, and Hathorn and Parker halls became the sole property of the College.
Thirty-one buildings have been added to the original two; instead of twelve acres the campus encompasses a hundred; from five students in 1863 it has grown to over eight hundred, and from a faculty of six, shared with the Seminary, to nearly seventy members in instruction and administration. But Hathorn Hall, on the little knoll at the heart of the College, still dominates the scene, its fine proportions as pleasing to the eye and its sweeping lines as uplifting to the spirit today as in its youth. In sturdy dignity, it gives promise of service to many generations of students yet to come.
Listed in National Register of Historic Places in 1970.
The National Register of Historic Places is the official list of the Nation’s historic places worthy of preservation. Authorized by the National Historic Preservation Act of 1966, the National Park Service’s National Register of Historic Places is part of a national program to coordinate and support public and private efforts to identify, evaluate, and protect America’s historic and archeological resources.