History
By 1819, a Pennsylvania Ministerium committee (Rev. John George Schmucker, D.D., Conrad Jaeger and H. A. Muhlenberg) began planning a Protestant seminary. After the board of directors first met on March 2, 1826; a selection group of 9 rejected proposals from Carlisle, Pennsylvania (at Dickinson College) and Hagerstown, Maryland; and the "Gettysburg Theological Seminary" was established on August 1, 1826. Samuel Simon Schmucker was elected the first professor and the seminary opened with 11 students on September 5, 1826, at the 1810 Gettysburg Academy building. In 1832 the seminary moved to its first building on the ridge west of the borough between the Chambersburg Pike and Nichol's Gap Road, north of the site used for Herman Haupt's residence and his 1837 Oakridge Select Academy ("Mrs. Schultz" residence during the battle).
- Battle of Gettysburg
- With 2 professor residences during the American Civil War ("C.P.Krauth" & "S.S.Schmucker"), the seminary was the site of Battle of Gettysburg, First Day, combat and had buildings burned during the battle. The Schmucker Hall cupola was used as an observatory on June 30, and"the Schmucker house" residence was later ransacked by Confederates. On July 1 from ~4 p.m. until dark, the Third Richmond Howitzers (with "four 3 inch rifles") fired from the seminary onto Cemetery Hill and received counterfire (Robert E. Lee's headquarters was north of the seminary). Seminary buildings became field hospitals (Amos Blakeslee was a doctor, and Sarah Broadhead was a nurse) and the last patient of the seminary's Old Dorm left on September 16, 1863.
In 1868 seminary land was purchased for the Gettysburg Springs Railroad (now Springs Avenue) and the faculty expanded to a 4th professor (James W. Richard) in 1889. In 1895 during the battlefield commemorative era, the Gettysburg Park Commission telfordized the seminary's north-south avenue (resurfaced in 1927). In 1896, the seminary had 2 academic buildings, 4 professor dwellings, a hospital, and ~38 acres (15 ha). After preceding faculty chairmen beginning with Schmucker, the 1st seminary president was designated in 1906; and the park commission had placed 2 Confederate 3" rifles, 2 other Confederate guns, and 2 Union 12 pounders ("False Napolean") along the avenue by 1912. During the World War II labor shortage, the seminary assisted with the county's 1942 apple harvest before German POWs became available, and a seminary auxiliary was organized in 1953. Circa 1960 the seminary purchased the nearby Elsie Singmaster Lewars home and in 1961, the Adams County Historical Society moved from the courthouse basement to Old Dorm (added to the NRHP in 1974). The 2011 "Crossroads Campaign" planned $1.8 million of fundraising for chapel renovations.