If the walls of University Hall could talk, they might tell you about the time they met George Washington (although don’t believe them if they tell you he slept here). The first building constructed on Brown’s campus, University Hall, has played host to wounded soldiers during the Revolutionary War as well as our nation’s first president, during his visit to Rhode Island in 1790. The Providence Gazette reported that despite Washington’s habit of not going out in the evening, he made his way from his lodging at the Golden Ball Inn to University Hall to accept the invitation of Brown University undergraduates. In a patriotic display, students outfitted each of the Hall’s windows with candles aglow.

Renowned for “The Brown Curriculum,” an innovative approach to undergraduate education instituted in 1970, Brown University’s philosophy states that students, who are free to design their own curriculum, are “the architects of their own course of study.” Founded in 1764 by Baptists as the College of Rhode Island, the school moved to Providence in 1770. The institution changed its name to “Brown University” in 1804 after a generous donation by Nicholas Brown, prominent Providence businessman and alumnus of the school.

With over 250 years of history under its belt, Brown University understandably boasts many styles of architecture. One of the most noticeable structures on campus is the Carrie Tower (1904). Paul Bajnotti commissioned the tower to honor the memory of his wife, Caroline Mathilde Brown, grandaughter of Nicholas Brown, Brown University’s namesake.

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As the population of the East Side grew in the 18th century, residences sprang up quickly along Benefit Street. Intended for “the common benefit of all,” Benefit Street encouraged the construction of homes higher on the ridge of modern-day College Hill while still remaining within existing property limits. This was possible because of the very narrow, but long, plots that Roger Williams designated for the new community of Providence in 1636. These plots began at the edge of the Great Salt River and Cove, and extended up the hill. Colonists typically used the higher land to plant fruit orchards and graze livestock. Unlike many other New England towns, the Providence settlement faced the waterway, rather than surrounding a meeting house. The emphasis on religious liberty explains this choice: since colonial authorities in Rhode Island could not force men and women to worship, the Church did not serve as the center of the community, literally or figuratively.

This unique orientation of the settlement did not mean, however, that Providence townspeople did not worship. Most did so, and they first used private homes before a meeting house was constructed to better serve the religious needs of the community. Roger Williams founded the first Baptist congregation in the U.S. in 1638. In 1775, while Providence enjoyed economic success, the Baptists made a new and bold move in erecting this magnificent building, the First Baptist Church. The largest surviving wooden structure from Colonial America, it combines the simple hall of a traditional New England meeting house with the most fashionable English architectural features, such as the steeple, modeled after a version of the one at St. Martin in the Fields (1724), on Trafalgar Square in London, by architect James Gibbs. Brown University, founded as a Baptist college, has held its annual commencement in the church every year since 1776.

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