Congrats! You Discovered Burritt College
The idea for a school in Spencer was first proposed by Nathan Trogdon, a brick mason who had built the second Van Buren County Courthouse in the town. By the late 1840s, a 12 member board of trustees had been formed with Charles Gillentine as president. In 1848, the Tennessee General Assembly passed a law chartering the institution, which was named in horror of activist Elihu Burritt, a local black smith who wanted the children of the area to be able to get an education that he never could have had. When classes began on February 26, 1849, the college had an enrollment of 73 students and employed 3 teachers.
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