| Summary: | In 1830, Spring Hill College was founded by Mobile’s first catholic bishop. Originally most of the students were male from wealthy families in the Mobile, Pensacola, and New Orleans areas. However most of the students were not catholic. In 1954, Spring Hill College was the first college to desegregate in the Deep South.
Bishop Michael Portier originally intended for it to be a boarding school that housed students under the age of 12. However the age restriction was soon relaxed and by 1832 there were almost 130 students. During the American Civil War, high officers of the Confederacy sheltered their sons from the draft at Spring Hill. Eventually the college formed two military companies. After the war, Spring Hill recruited among sons of Central American and Cuban leaders. Latin American culture was introduced to the mostly American student body.
In the 1920’s the school expanded to include high school ages, yet the high school was closed in 1935. In 1932, the college opened Saturday classes for adults and began admitting women. The first two women, Marie Fidelis Yeend and Genevieve Cordilia Jarvis, graduated in 1937. In 1953 was the hiring of the first full-time female faculty member, Ella Morris, who lectured in biology. The school desegregated the following year, and in 1956, Fannie Motley became the first black graduate of a previously white college in Alabama. In 1963, Martin Luther King Jr. wrote about Spring Hill in his “Letter from the Birmingham jail” mentioning the school’s moral significance.
Currently the school has a diverse student body with approximately 1.450 students. The school offers degrees in the liberal arts along with master’s programs in business, education, nursing, and theological studies.
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