University of West Georgia

In January, 1908, the Fourth District Agricultural and Mechanical School opened here with 96 students under Principal John Holland Melson. In 1933 the state withdrew support from its agricultural high schools and also Bowdon College, eleven miles west of here. As a result, this school was reorganized as West Georgia College, a junior unit of the University System of Georgia. It became a senior college in 1957 under President Irvine Sullivan Ingram who headed the institution from 1920 to 1960. This was the longest administrative tenure in the history of the University of Georgia if its system schools are included. Originally there were two brick buildings, being Melson Hall and the Administration building. Adamson Hall was added in 1917. All stand in (1966) west of this point. The frame structure on this site was built c. 1845 as a plantation house of Thomas Bonner. In April 1865, the house was raided by Federal cavalry under Brigadier-General John T. Croxton whose campsite was at a road-forks one mile west of here. The house became the first women´s dormitory on this campus. Until 1917 its location was 300 yeards west of this point. Franklin D. Roosevelt delivered the commencement address here in 1929.