Collegiate Gothic: The Architecture of Rhodes College

Collegiate Gothic: The Architecture of Rhodes College by Morgan, William. hardcover edition. ISBN: 9780826206992.

The buildings of Rhodes College in Memphis, Tennessee, constitute one of the finest expressions of the Collegiate Gothic style, although they are little known outside the South. When the small Presbyterian college known as Southwestern moved from Clarksville to Memphis in 1925, college president Charles Diehl was determined to create a scholarly enclave in the model of the “Oxbridge in America” campuses, particularly Princeton and Yale. Southwestern At Memphis was not the only Collegiate Gothic campus begun in the pre-Depression days, but it is one of very few that have maintained their commitment to the Gothic style. Diehl employed Charles Z. Klauder, the preeminent campus architect of the time, as supervising architect, and Klauder protégés Henry Hibbs and Clinton Parrent designed and supervised construction of Gothic quadrangles and towers through the 19605; subsequent architects have attempted the difficult task of maintaining the Gothic legacy. Collegiate Gothic portrays the patrons who supported the development of the campus- especially Charles Diehl and his successors Peyton Rhodes and Iames Daughdrill—and recounts their belief that architecture, particularly Gothic, is essential to the liberal arts mission of the college. More broadly, this volume sets their concerns, and the buildings that resulted, in a national context, revealing much about the planning and execution of the Collegiate Gothic style in this century.