Before Thanksgiving, I drove over to the University of Virginia (UVA, or U.Va.) and did the campus tour offered by their University Guide Service. It's similar to Auburn's Student Recruiters (which I tried out for but didn't make, sniff), but with a LOT more history to share.
The University of Virginia was founded by Thomas Jefferson after his retirement from politics. Mr. Jefferson first wrote about his desire to found a college when he was Vice President of the United States. Although he was a graduate of Virginia's only university at the time, The College of William and Mary, he thought that the level of education there was diminishing and that his beloved home state needed an institute of higher learning more centrally located, unaffiliated with any religious sect, and one that taught more of the sciences. It was one of the earliest colleges in America, and the first school founded without religious affiliation.
Mr. Jefferson's college came about years after his first musings, and Jefferson was involved in just about every aspect of its inception.
There is a long-honored tradition of streaking in the Academical Village. Said streaker(s) start on the steps of the Rotunda, and run all the way down the lawn and back. It's apparently pretty funny anytime someone forgets that the lawn is tiered and face plants on their way down the lawn.
The layout of the college, the "Academical Village", was based on a large terraced lawn with the Rotunda, which served as the library, on one end, and a series of ten pavilions along the sides. The pavilions were each the home of a professor, who lived on the top floor and taught classes on the main floor. The pavilions are connected by a series of students' quarters and have their own gardens enclosed by a serpentine wall on the back side. Behind the gardens are six hotels (dining quarters and service rooms) and more student housing.
View from the bottom of the terraced lawn, facing the Rotunda.
Jefferson disliked the single building structure of William and Mary (where all of the dorm rooms, classrooms, and everything else were all in a single building) and thought it was not conducive to the learning environment. His design afforded more privacy and quiet for study, while still providing an intimacy within the campus.
The Rotunda.
My cute little guide was from Huntsville, AL. How ironic!
He actually wasn't that little, he's a junior in finance.
The center of campus, the Rotunda, was based on the Pantheon and is half its width and height. The main room is the domed room in the center of the building. There are two oval rooms flanking either side of the domed room. One of them was Jefferson's office.
The Rotunda was originally used as the library, but is now used as a sort of meeting room. Since it was the largest room of the small campus, it had to be fairly versatile. Dances were held in the Rotunda, and the side bookshelves were designed so that if you are standing in the middle of the room, they are hidden from sight.
The upper story of the dome carries sound surprisingly well. You could whisper a secret on one side of the circular floor to someone on the opposite side of the room, who would be able to hear everything you said. Upperclassmen would have unsuspecting first year students take their dates up to the second floor and then listen in on the private conversation from the opposite side of the room. They would then have sufficient ammo to embarrass them at breakfast the next morning.
In 1895, some of the outbuilding and the Rotunda caught fire. The students mustered together to save this statue of Jefferson, which had been in the dome room. The statue was thought to be one of the best representations of the third President, and his granddaughter nearly fainted upon seeing it because she said it was an exact likeness. The statue is in excellent condition and only suffered a small chip on the bottom of his coat as the students and faculty hoisted it out of the Rotunda as the building was burning down around them.
Tradition is that the secret societies leave letters for one another in Jefferson's hand. So if you happen to visit and see something tucked into his hand, it might just be communication between secret society members.
The ten pavilions of the Academical Village are all unique. Jefferson had the construction begin on the "seventh" pavilion. He frequently skipped around during construction, starting one section, putting it on hold, and then progressing work on another area. Since most of the funding for the school was being provided by the state, he feared that if the school was to have a couple of initial buildings completed, someone might decide that was sufficient and cut off funding for the remainder of the project. He wanted to ensure that the entire design would be completed.
Many of the pavilions still house honored faculty and professors. Larry Sabato, head of UVA's Center for Politics, author of Sabato's Crystal Ball, and a renowned expert on American politics, lives in Pavilion IV.
Undergraduates still live in the original student rooms, which line the Lawn. Each year, there is high competition to be chosen as one of the 50 students to live in the Academical Village. There are no bathrooms in the student housing, so they have to walk to communal baths. Firewood is still delivered regularly for use in the rooms' fireplaces. I think it would be so much fun to get to live here for a year!
Although the school was founded without any religious connection, it does have a beautiful chapel just off of the Academical Village.
Jefferson was not anti-religion. He was anti state-affiliated/sponsored religion.
Jefferson was not anti-religion. He was anti state-affiliated/sponsored religion.
Jefferson's Academical Village, facing South (looking away from the Rotunda).The building at the end was a later addition. Beforehand, the Academical Village opened up to the South with a sweeping view of the Blue Ridge Mountains. Graduations were held on the lawn, where graduates received their degree on the steps of the Rotunda and walked down the lawn, out of the South end, to symbolize them taking their acquired knowledge into the world. Graduations are still held here, almost 200 years later.
Each of the gardens behind the pavilions is unique. Some are open and formal. Others, like this one, are more enclosed and rustic.
I loved this tour! My only regret is that they do not offer them during school breaks or the summer, as the tours are all student-lead. I'm really glad I jumped on a tour while I was still able, and would love to do it again. Each guide is encouraged to personalize his tour, concentrating on different facts and stories as they are of interest to them, so no two guides' tours should ever be the same.
