In 1972, the new social sciences building opened, named for Joseph Grégoire de Roulhac Hamilton, a longtime professor of history and founder of the Southern Historical Collection. In his scholarship, influenced heavily by his training at Columbia University under William Dunning, Hamilton took a racist view of the Reconstruction period, praising the Ku Klux Klan for “lift[ing] the South from its slough of despond.” Hamilton Hall, now the home of the Department of History, remains a site of contestation as student groups demand for the removal of Hamilton’s name from the building.
In 1972, the new social sciences building opened, named for Joseph Grégoire de Roulhac Hamilton, a longtime professor of history and founder of the Southern Historical Collection. In his scholarship, influenced heavily by his training at Columbia University under William Dunning, Hamilton took a racist view of the Reconstruction period, praising the Ku Klux Klan for “lift[ing] the South from its slough of despond.” Hamilton Hall, now the home of the Department of History, remains a site of contestation as student groups demand for the removal of Hamilton’s name from the building.
Space Use: Academic
Spatial Organizing Approach: Contestation
Date Created: 1972
Campus Space: Saunders Hall
Citation: Liz Mason-Deese, “Map in Ruptures, Vol. 1,” Counter Cartographies Collective, 11 November 2017.