Last updated: December 23, 2023
Place
Robert O. Wilder Building
Photograph by Lisa Reynolds, courtesy of the Mississippi State Historic Preservation Office
Quick Facts
Location:
Tougaloo College, Tougaloo, Mississippi
Significance:
Architecture, Education
Designation:
Listed in the National Register - Reference number 82003106
MANAGED BY:
The Robert O. Wilder Building, formerly known as the John W. Boddie Building or the Tougaloo Mansion House, on the campus of Tougaloo College in Tougaloo, Mississippi, was listed in the National Register of Historic Places in 1982. The mansion is significant as one of the original buildings of Tougaloo College, an HBCU.
In 1869, the American Missionary Association of New York purchased a tract of land from former slave owner John W. Boddie, including his mansion. The Association sought to start a co-educational school for the enslaved people who had been freed at the conclusion of the Civil War, and worked quickly to convert the buildings on the property, and the mansion in particular, into school buildings. Costs of construction on the school's new buildings, including dining halls, dormitories, and a lecture hall, were paid by the education department of the U.S. government's Bureau of Refugees and Freedmen. Like many of the schools supported by the American Missionary Association, construction of these buildings relied on manual labor of students.
In 1871, the school received a charter from the Mississippi government under the name Tougaloo University. In 1897, the school began to offer classes for college credit, and until the 1920s primarily served as a teacher training school before pivoting to a liberal arts curriculum. By the 1960s, after a number of mergers, the school was renamed Tougaloo College. During that same decade, the school was at the forefront of the Mississippi Civil Rights Movement, providing safe haven for Freedom Riders and a protected space for the development of protest strategies. The Tougaloo Nine, who staged notable sit-ins of segregated public institutions like libraries and were arrested for their efforts, were all students at Tougaloo College.
In order to better reflect the school's history and mission as an HBCU, the John W. Boddie house was renamed after Robert O. Wilder, a university trustee.
In 1869, the American Missionary Association of New York purchased a tract of land from former slave owner John W. Boddie, including his mansion. The Association sought to start a co-educational school for the enslaved people who had been freed at the conclusion of the Civil War, and worked quickly to convert the buildings on the property, and the mansion in particular, into school buildings. Costs of construction on the school's new buildings, including dining halls, dormitories, and a lecture hall, were paid by the education department of the U.S. government's Bureau of Refugees and Freedmen. Like many of the schools supported by the American Missionary Association, construction of these buildings relied on manual labor of students.
In 1871, the school received a charter from the Mississippi government under the name Tougaloo University. In 1897, the school began to offer classes for college credit, and until the 1920s primarily served as a teacher training school before pivoting to a liberal arts curriculum. By the 1960s, after a number of mergers, the school was renamed Tougaloo College. During that same decade, the school was at the forefront of the Mississippi Civil Rights Movement, providing safe haven for Freedom Riders and a protected space for the development of protest strategies. The Tougaloo Nine, who staged notable sit-ins of segregated public institutions like libraries and were arrested for their efforts, were all students at Tougaloo College.
In order to better reflect the school's history and mission as an HBCU, the John W. Boddie house was renamed after Robert O. Wilder, a university trustee.