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HISTORY OF HILLSDALE COLLEGE BY HON. JOHN C. PATTERSON, 1883
The body thus constituted claimed to be the lawful board and custodians of the corporate property. At the last meeting of the regular board of trustees at Spring Arbor, Col. Moses Benedict, at the head of a committee from the new board on the locality, demanded the books, papers, and property of the corporation at Spring Arbor. The old board refused to receive the gentleman as a committee from any authorized source. Thus the contest between the two committees, two boards, and two parties was carried on. Part of the records were lost. The library and apparatus were scattered. The Spring Arbor faction retained the grounds, the library, philosophical apparatus, and the property of the old corporation, no part of it ever being received by Hillsdale. Hillsdale College, however, did secure the faculty, the brains, and the living soul of the old college at Spring Arbor. The material home for the new college was furnished by the
liberality of Hillsdale county. The denomination abandoned the lifeless body at Spring Arbor and nourished and sustained the living organization at
Hillsdale.
Prof. Charles H. Churchill, a member of the old faculty, taught a select ' -school at Spring Arbor during the academic year of 1853 and 1854. Though this select school had no connection with the old college, it was favored and patronized by the local party because it kept up the appearance of a school. Many of the students of the college remained there and pursued their studies, I and the Hillsdale party, having full faith in the fidelity of Prof. Churchill to their cause, encouraged the school, knowing it would tend to keep the students together, and to keep up a quasi organization among them while the buildings were being erected at Hillsdale. Prof. Churchill's select school received support from both factions during the year of its existence, and constitutes the ad interim connecting link between the old college and the new.
EARLY MICHIGAN
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