Erskine College History

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History of Erskine College

History of Erskine College

Erskine was founded by the Associate Reformed Presbyterian (ARP) Church in 1839. Prior to this time the church had established an academy for men in 1835 and a seminary in 1837. This academy became Erskine College, the first four-year denominational college in South Carolina.

By the mid-nineteenth century, Erskine had become a thriving regional college. Following the Civil War, loyal supporters rebuilt the endowment wiped out by the conflict. They also financed construction of the Erskine Building and established chairs in Chemistry and English Literature under widely respected professors. These professors helped Erskine establish a reputation for academic excellence as the college moved from the classical to the liberal arts curriculum.

Also enhancing this reputation were the Erskine literary societies, as old as the college, which trained championship debaters and supplemented speech and literary training. The large auditorium constructed in 1892 brought renowned speakers to Erskine and continued Erskine’s role as a cultural and educational center of the South Carolina Piedmont.

Erskine also played a leadership role in women’s education in the state. The Due West Female College (later Due West Woman’s College) was founded independently by ARP ministers and laymen in 1859 and came officially under the control of the ARP Church in 1904. Erskine College first began admitting transfer students from the women’s college in 1894 and became officially coeducational in 1899.

A planned merger of the college, women’s college, and seminary paved the way for accreditation by the Southern Association of Colleges in 1925. By 1927 the three schools had merged into one institution called Erskine College, with the seminary serving as its graduate theological school.

During World War II Erskine served as a cadet training school for the United States Army Air Corps. A substantial enrollment effort in the late 1950s brought Erskine’s undergraduate enrollment to over 700 students throughout the 1960s and into the 1970s.

In 2014, Erskine celebrated 175 years as a Christian academic community, and in Fall 2022, Erskine’s student population topped 1,000 for the first time in the institution’s history. In recent years, Erskine has been consistently ranked nationally among the best liberal arts colleges by various listings, including U.S. News & World Report and Forbes.