Fountain Hall on the campus of Morris Brown College has been included on the Georgia Trust for Historic Preservation’s 2020 list of 10 Places in Peril in the state.
A National Historic Landmark, Fountain Hall was built in 1882 and remains the most prominent building on the original campus of Atlanta University, which was founded in 1865 to educate newly emancipated African Americans. Originally named Stone Hall, the building was renamed after the school became Morris Brown College in the early 1930s to honor former college president Bishop William A. Fountain. Famed writer W.E.B. Du Bois wrote his classic “The Souls of Black Folk” in his office at Fountain Hall while he was a professor at Atlanta University in 1903.
Boarded up since 2003, Fountain Hall has fallen victim to both vandalism and the intrusion of weather. Left unattended, the building could face a similar fate to its historic neighbors, Gaines Hall and Furber Cottage, both severely damaged by fire in recent years. The building was awarded a repair grant from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation over the summer, so there is hope that it will be saved from destruction.
Also making this year’s list of Places is Peril: Antioch Baptist Church in Crawfordville (Taliaferro County); Asbury United Methodist Church in Savannah (Chatham County); Cary Reynolds Elementary School in Doraville (DeKalb County); Central State Hospital in Milledgeville (Baldwin County); Heritage Park in Griffin (Spalding County); John Nelson Deming Home in Valdosta (Lowndes County); Masonic Lodge #238 in Dalton (Whitfield County); Nolan Crossroads in Bostwick (Morgan County); and Rose Hill School in Porterdale (Newton County).
“This is the Trust’s fifteenth annual Places in Peril list,” said Mark C. McDonald, president and CEO of the Trust. “We hope the list will continue to bring preservation solutions to Georgia’s imperiled historic resources by highlighting ten representative sites.”
For more, visit georgiatrust.org.
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