For Historic Landscape Preservation of Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary, Wake Forest
The campus of the Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary is located in the heart of Wake Forest. The 25-acre main campus quadrangle and its historic buildings and setting are contributing resources in the Wake Forest National Register Historic District.
Originally constructed and the first campus of Wake Forest College, the town of Wake Forest grew up around the college between the 1830s and the 1950s when Wake Forest College (now University) moved west to Winston-Salem. In 1950 the Southern Baptist Convention purchased the campus for the purpose of training Baptist ministers. Today Southeastern serves approximately 2,800 students in over 30 different undergraduate, graduate and doctoral degree programs.
The campus’ core contains buildings rendered in Classical and Colonial Revival styles and dating from 1888-1952. Eleven historic buildings, three of them designed by noted North Carolina architect William H. Deitrick, are set within a picturesque academic quadrangle crisscrossed by curvilinear brick walking paths. Landscape gardener Major Englehardt is credited with the layout of the curving walkways in the 1880s. The campus is encircled by a dry laid fieldstone wall with arched iron entrances at the compass points on the north, south and west sides. The wall dates from 1885-1900 and is attributed to “Doctor Tom” the school’s African American caretaker. Douglas Buttram repaired the wall in the early 1990s while a student at the seminary. The main campus entrance on the east side is marked by a large granite arch erected in 1909. Within the quadrangle and around the campus perimeter are a variety of large specimen trees and shrubs including ancient cedars, magnolias and oaks. Many of these plantings occurred during the presidency of Charles Elisha Taylor (1884-1905). The campus also features gazebos, fountains, benches and many well-tended perennial flower beds. Newer buildings are architecturally compatible with the old and include the recent brick Colonial Revival-style classroom buildings Stephens-Mackie Hall (1999) and Jacumin-Simpson Mission Center (2002) and the recently completed Dorothy and Page Patterson Hall at the campus’ west end.
The campus of Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary is a historic landscape of vital importance to the town as well as the many graduates of Wake Forest College and Southeastern Seminary. Southeastern has done an exemplary job maintaining its campus and new growth has been handled in a responsible way, integrating new facilities into the historic fabric of the campus.
The Board of Directors of Capital Area Preservation, Inc. is pleased to present a 2011 Anthemion Award to Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary for the ongoing preservation and stewardship of its historic landscape and campus.