Transylvania Pioneer College of the West 1793-1829 - Lexington, KY, USA
N 38° 03.066 W 084° 29.665
16S E 719847 N 4214448
Marker is at the intersection of West 3rd Street and North Mill Street, on the right when traveling east on West 3rd Street in Gratz Park. Bronze marker is on a limestone monument there is no DAR insignia.
Waymark Code: WM184GD
Location: Kentucky, United States
Date Posted: 05/28/2023
Views: 3
The Old Kitchen Building is located on the edge of Gratz Park and is a link between modern Lexington and its early history, as the only surviving building from the original Transylvania College campus. The building was constructed as classroom space in the early 19th-century. It was deemed the "Kitchen" by the students of the college because it was so inadequate as a classroom. This inadequacy led to the construction of the larger Transylvania main building in 1816 in the center of Gratz Park. This main building, the "Kitchen," and a third building on the opposite side of Gratz Park were the original buildings of the Transylvania College campus. The main building was destroyed by fire in 1829, after which the campus was moved with the construction of Old Morrison in 1833. By 1857 the other college building in Gratz Park had disappeared, leaving only the Kitchen from the original campus.
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During the early 1800s, Transylvania, which means “over the fields,” was the dominant medical school in Kentucky, beginning with a medical department in 1799 and a full medical college in 1818. It was the fourth college with a medical department established in the United States and the first west of the Allegheny Mountains.
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