History
The school is named after the former Sweet Briar plantation, the former plantation of Elijah Fletcher and his family. Fletcher was a 19th century teacher, businessman, and mayor of Lynchburg. His wife, Maria Crawford, is credited with naming the land Sweet Briar. By the mid-19th century, Fletcher had between 80 and 100 slaves at the plantation. After their emancipation in 1865, several continued to work for pay and live at Sweet Briar. On Elijah Fletcher's death, his daughter, Indiana, inherited the plantation.
When she passed in 1900, she willed the land and much of her assets to starting a college for women, as her daughter Daisy had passed at 16 and, therefore, never had a chance to attend college.
Read more about this topic: Sweet Briar College
Famous quotes containing the word history:
“I feel as tall as you.”
—Ellis Meredith, U.S. suffragist. As quoted in History of Woman Suffrage, vol. 4, ch. 14, by Susan B. Anthony and Ida Husted Harper (1902)
“The history of the genesis or the old mythology repeats itself in the experience of every child. He too is a demon or god thrown into a particular chaos, where he strives ever to lead things from disorder into order.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“The history of all hitherto existing society is the history of class struggles.”
—Karl Marx (1818–1883)