The Council of Independent Colleges: Historic Campus Architecture Project

Miriam Jackson Home

Click on image titles for larger views.

Miriam Jackson Home (ca. 1932), Huntingdon College

Miriam Jackson Home (ca. 2004), Huntingdon College

Institution Name: Huntingdon College
Original/Historic Place Name: Miriam Jackson Infirmary
Location on Campus: 1500 E. Fairview Ave.
Date(s) of Construction:

1923-1924

original construction Lockwood, Frank

Designer: Frank Lockwood (Montgomery, AL)
Type of Place: Individual building
Style: Gothic revival, Other (Glossary)
Significance: architecture, culture, education
Narrative: see below
References: see below

Materials:

Foundation: brick and cement

Walls: brick

Roof: slate

Function:

ca. 1924-1960	infirmary
ca. 2004-present (2006)	administration (business and finance offices and the office of the registrar)

Narrative:
Designed by Montgomery architect Frank Lockwood (who also designed Bellingrath Hall, Houghton Memorial Library, and Hanson Hall), Miriam Jackson Home (then the Miriam Jackson Infirmary) was the college infirmary from its opening on March 4, 1924 until the 1960s. The Women's College of Alabama was one of the first colleges in the South to have a well-equipped infirmary building (Rhoda Coleman Ellison, History of Huntingdon College: 1854-1954 [Birmingham: University of Alabama Press, 1954], 209-210).

This former infirmary is a 2 ½ story, symmetrical, brick house designed in the Tudor Revival style. Jackson home has a basement and a side-gabled roof with exposed ends that is clad in slate. A centrally located, slightly projecting, gabled bay dominates the front façade. The main entrance is located here and features a Gothic arched glass tympanum and the original Gibbs surround. A terrace with wrought iron balustrade crowns the wing, accessible by a single leaf entrance on the second story.

References:

Ellison, Rhoda Coleman. History of Huntingdon College: 1854-1954. Birmingham, AL: University of Alabama Press, 1954.

Enzweiler, Susan, and Trina Binkley. Huntingdon College Campus Historic District. National Register of Historic Places designation report. Washington, DC: U.S. Department of the Interior/National Park Service, 2000.

Memorandum to Melanie Betz from Anne Henderson, November 30, 1992. Montgomery, AL: Alabama Historical Commission.

Olmsted, Frederick Law, Jr. Report on Methodist College for Women, Montgomery, Ala. [Brookline, MA: Olmsted Brothers Landscape Architects], 1908.