Built as a gift to the people of Porterdale by James H. Porter in memory of his father and Porterdale founder Oliver Saffold Porter (1836-1914), the Porter Memorial Gym was one of the main gathering places in the community until the decline of the mills. It was designed by one of Georgia’s first female architects, Ellamae Ellis League.
Though a 2005 fire destroyed much of the structure and collapsed the roof, the foundation and walls remain were re-enforced and the site is occasionally used for gatherings and community events.
Porterdale Historic District, National Register of Historic Places
This typical early-20th-century commercial block originally housed offices for the textile mills that dominated life in Porterdale. The executives and paymaster had offices upstairs while the mayor’s office was located downstairs. Circa 1925, according to the National Register of Historic Places, Porterdale mills were among the largest spinning mills in the nation, with over 75,000 spindles.
Since the closure of the mills, it has been home to myriad businesses, including a barber, shoe shop, doctor, dentist, drug store, funeral home, restaurant, and even the Porterdale post office. After later remodeling and an altered roofline, it has been returned to its more traditional appearance.
Porterdale Historic District, National Register of Historic Places
As evident in this photograph, and the one below, the Julia A. Porter Church commands a high point in downtown Porterdale, dominating the skyline when seen from the Yellow River bridge.
According to a church history, Rev. Firley Baum was appointed the first pastor of the “Porterdale Mission” by the North Georgia Conference of the Methodist Episcopal Church, South, in 1903. 35 charter members joined the Porterdale Church and first met in the Community Building, and from 1917 until the construction of the present structure, the met in the Porterdale School. Rev. J. J. Mize led a capital campaign for the construction of the new church, which was completed in 1925. James Hyde Porter (1873-1949) was the largest benefactor and asked only that the church be named for his mother, Julia Antoinette McCracken Porter (1838-1926), which it was. Mrs. Porter was known for her charitable work within the mill community and was turned the first shovel of dirt and was present at the dedication. One source states she died a year later but her gravestone records the date as 1926. Her charitable works continue not only within the congregation but through a foundation that still sustains the community.
Porterdale Historic District, National Register of Historic Places
The Welaunee Inn originally served as housing for unmarried female employees of the Welaunee Mill, essentially a dormitory. Built in the Tudor Revival style in 1923 [some sources date it to 1920], it had 26 rooms. By the 1950s it was often referred to as the Village Inn, or simply, the Inn. It was sold by the mill in 1966. It’s a massive building, located on Broad Street near the center of town, and has rear-facing wings at either end. It’s still in good condition and though empty at present, has so much potential.
It’s best remembered today not as a hotel but, as Darrell Huckaby wrote in the Newton Community Magazine, “…the Center of Georgia’s Culinary Universe”. He noted, “In the 1950s and into the 1960s, Mrs. Effie Boyd served up some of the best Southern cooking this side of Heaven, from fried chicken and baked ham to roast turkey and country fried steak.” He recalled that Brown’s Guide to Georgia, the state’s periodical travel bible for many years, christened it the state’s best meat-and-three year after year after year. He also said that mill workers didn’t get lunch breaks during the week but folks from “town”, i.e. Covington, were faithful patrons. On Sundays, he said, people from everywhere would line up for hours to sample her Southern favorites. And, “If you have all those vegetables, you have to have cornbread and biscuits with which to sop. Effie Boyd’s biscuits were as good as anybody’s biscuits who ever sifted flour, and her cornbread came in pones, muffins or sticks, depending on the day of the week and her mood.”
Porterdale Historic District, National Register of Historic Places
In Cornerstone and Grove, Erik Blackburn Oliver notes: “Seney Hall is the most recognized and celebrated building on the Oxford campus, arguably among the most marvelous edifices ever built by Emory College or the University.” The Victorian landmark was designed by the firm of William H. Parkins and Andrew Bruce, the most prominent practitioners in Atlanta at the time.
A beloved symbol of the college to this day, Seney Hall was built to be the most prominent building on campus, replacing Old Main, which originally served that purpose and had been razed in 1872. Its namesake was a Brooklyn banker, George I. Seney. Seney had been so inspired by a sermon by Emory College president Atticus Haygood, urging sectional and racial reconciliation, that he gifted the school with over $130,000 in 1880. It has stood the test of time and now houses administrative offices.
An aside: Like its neighbor, Johnson Hall, Seney Hall also makes an appearance in the opening sequence of the television show, The Dukes of Hazzard.
Oxford Historic District, National Register of Historic Places
Emory College president Warren Candler, concerned about fire vulnerability on the Oxford campus, began lobbying for the construction of a dedicated library building after a fire consumed the old recitation hall in 1891. At the time, the library was housed on the third floor of Seney Hall and this was cause for concern. A committee was formed in 1897, their efforts culminated in the construction of Candler Hall. The architect, Samuel Manning Patton (1857-1897), who had designed several prominent buildings in Chattanooga, sadly died in a fire in one of them the same year Candler Hall was completed. Clad in Tennessee limestone with a foundation of local gneiss, the Stripped Neoclassical building stands in contrast to other buildings on the quad, with a more “modern” feel. It served as the library until 1970 when it was replaced by the truly modern Hoke O’Kelley Memorial Library across the quad. Candler Hall is now home to Campus Life offices and the college bookstore.
Oxford Historic District, National Register of Historic Places
One of the stated purposes of Emory College was the integration of religion and education and to this end a chapel was built in 1838 to serve the students and by extension the community. It was a simple wooden structure, typical of churches of the time, and was used until the construction of this more formal structure in 1875. When the present chapel was completed, the old prayer chapel was donated to and moved off campus for the use of Rust Chapel, an African-American congregation. When Emory College was founded, nearly everyone in the community was affiliated with the Methodist church, but today, the prayer chapel serves people of all faiths.
Oxford Historic District, National Register of Historic Places
Now known as Johnson Hall, for Oxford alumnus Judge Horace J. Johnson, Jr., this Romanesque structure was traditionally known as Language Hall and hosted classes engaged in English, Greek, and Latin studies. It was constructed of brick and originally had a texture stucco siding, now replaced with a plain stucco.
According to The Dukes of Hazzard Wiki, the building was also seen on the opening of every episode of the Dukes of Hazzard, beginning with the second episode. It served as the backdrop for the General Lee’s famous jump over Sheriff Roscoe P. Cotrane’s police cruiser as the Duke boys made their getaway. The 16-foot high, 81-foot jump saw the General Lee come to rest near Seney Hall, adjacent to Language Hall.
Oxford Historic District, National Register of Historic Places
The oldest and most prominent monument on the quad of the Oxford campus is this obelisk, presumably of Georgia marble, erected in 1849 in memory of the school’s first president, Ignatius Alonso Few (1789-1845), by the Phi Gamma and Few Societies and the Grand Masonic Lodge of Georgia. Few was the founding director of the Georgia Conference [Methodist] Manual Labor School, predecessor to Emory College, and the first president of Emory College.
Oxford Historic District, National Register of Historic Places
Few Hall, thanks to sensitive design, retains its grand Greek Revival appearance, though it’s now attached to a more modern facility and incorporated into the Tarbutton Performing Arts Center. Completed a year after Phi Gamma Hall, in 1852, it was home to the Few Society, named for Emory College’s first president, Ignatius Few. A literary society which grew out of the original Phi Gamma fraternity, the Few Society spent nearly a century engaged in weekly debates and friendly rivalries with their fellow students.
Few Hall originally housed a library on the ground floor and debate hall on the upper floor. Like Phi Gamma Hall, it also saw service in the Civil War, housing a detachment of nurses and doctors from nearby Hood Hospital in Covington.
Oxford Historic District, National Register of Historic Places
Vanishing Georgia: Photographs by Brian Brown 