The Campus Well

The Campus Well. . , "There by the Old Well in the twilight hours of a spring evening, I lie on the grass, listening to the sounds of a Beethoven symphony coming from an upper room of Wait Hall.", In the early days of Wake Forest College, founded in 1834, the students probably drew their water from the well that had served the former Calvin Jones plantation. That or another well, at some point updated with a hand pump, was in use into the 1900s. A new 101-foot well was dug in front of Wait Hall in 1911, reportedly going through 70 feet of solid rock, to supply water for this marble fountain donated by that year's graduating class., (illegible) were built over the hand pumps. The marble fountain was not covered until the present structure with wooden columns and metal roof was completed in 1935. A gift of the 1934 senior class, the "cover" had been designed in 1915 by New York architect Frank E. Perkins. , In 2001, the Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary, which now occupies the old Wake Forest College campus, gave the well to the Wake Forest College Birthplace Society. It was moved to this site and restored with funds given by many donors, including this listed at right., Names of Keepers and Patrons listed to the right.