For more than a century, the Theological Seminary of the Diocese of Ohio--better known as Bexley Hall--occupied its own little corner of Kenyon. The building still graces the north end of Middle Path, a stately reminder of the College's religious history.
That history began before Bexley even existed. Bishop Philander Chase, who founded Kenyon in 1824, trained the first theology students together with Professor William Sparrow. "It was basically the two of them serving as mentors," said College Historian Thomas P. Stamp '73. "It was more like an apprenticeship program."
The seminary building opened in 1843, after four years of construction. (Finishing touches took another fifteen years.) It was named for Nicholas Vansittart, Lord Bexley, a former Chancellor of the Exchequer who was active in the Church Missionary Society, part of the Anglican evangelical movement in England. The Tudor-Gothic structure was designed by Henry Roberts, the eminent
British architect best known for Fishmongers' Hall in London.
In its first decade, the seminary saw a maximum enrollment of a dozen students. By 1861, that number had grown to thirty-nine. Their studies included Biblical texts, homiletics, and a large dose of Anglican church history.
Despite occasional religious controversies and attendant drops in enrollment, Bexley Hall typically housed two dozen seminarians. It was a self-contained world, with the upper two floors providing dormitory space while an adjoining building served as the library.
Prominent church leaders with Bexley Hall ties have included Peter Kwong, who graduated in 1965 and served as the first archbishop of Hong Kong from 1981 to 2007.
The seminary remained in Gambier until 1968, when it moved to Rochester, New York, to affiliate with what is now Colgate Rochester Crozer Divinity School. Three decades later, in 2008, it returned to Ohio, moving to a site beside the Trinity Lutheran Seminary in the Columbus suburb of, yes, Bexley. (The community was named after the English parish that was home to one of the town's founding families.) Today, the seminary typically has about eighteen students.
The Kenyon building, meanwhile, has served since 1972 as the home to the College's studio art program. Former dorm areas are now cluttered studios where art majors bring their aesthetic visions to life. This era will end when the program moves to the Horvitz Art Building, now under construction and scheduled to open in 2012.
Marcella Hackbardt, who chairs the Art Department, has her office in what was once St. Mary's Chapel in the Bexley Hall building. The elegant dark woodwork of the office's ceiling and leaded glass windows reflect the space's ecclesiastical history.
Hackbardt said she receives visits from former seminarians perhaps once or twice a month. "They have vivid memories. It is such a great space, an uplifting space."
-Bill Mayr