The site selected for the University in ante-bellum times was ideal for the purpose to which it was consecrated. Sewanee is on a spur of the Cumberland Mountains,--a plateau some two thousand feet above the level of the sea and about one thousand feet above the surrounding valleys. The scenery is of unparalleled grandeur with many points of picturesque beauty,--primeval forests, cliffs, ravines and caves,--immediately at hand. The climate is of such a character as to exempt the residents from malarial or pulmonary troubles. It is especially adapted to the requirements of a school whose terms were to be held in the summer months and with mid-winter vacations, to suit the convenience of a southern population whose home life was more or less likely to be broken up in the summer.
The conception of a grand landed domain as an important feature in the planning and planting of an institution of learning, was at that time quite unusual in America. Colleges and universities had previously looked to populous centers and environment to build them up and sustain them. The University of the South deliberately chose to go out into the wilderness and create therein its own environment. The site had been carefully studied by Bishop Hopkins, who was an accomplished architect and landscape gardener, and who had it mapped, and had a tentative scheme of buildings designed for it upon the models of the English Universities.
In furtherance of the enterprise, Bishop Quintard accepted the tender of a lease, for educational purposes, of a school property in Winchester, twelve miles from Sewanee, at the foot of the mountains; and there established "Sewanee College," with Major Fairbanks as President of the Board of Trustees, and with Rev. F. L. Knight, D. D., and a competent faculty in charge. Although this Collegiate Institute was formally opened and remained in operation for a time, the Bishop found it too expensive for him to maintain; and so, as the University developed, he gave up the lease of the Winchester property and concentrated his efforts upon the work at Sewanee.
He made immediate efforts to collect funds to advance the work of building up the Diocesan Training School. He recorded with deep gratitude the gift of $1000 and of a handsome communion service from Mrs. Barnum of Baltimore. The following May, out of funds thus early collected, a building was erected and called "Otey Hall." That summer the Bishop and Major Fairbanks erected residences near Otey Hall and removed their families to Sewanee.