From 1895 to 1901, the house at 762 Nott Street was occupied by Mrs. Perkins' daughter Rose, her husband Jack, and their children. It was given to Edward Everett Hale Jr. (Jack) as incentive to come to Union, where he became Professor of Rhetoric and Logic and, later, Professor of English. Mrs. Perkins wrote of the renovations that were promised upon their arrival: "The Palmer house will be put in order for them; the roof raised and a room added, and a chimney put in place, and water put in" (March 26, 1895).
The family was generally very pleased with "The Orchard", as the Hale home was known. "The house will be very charming, and the light in the dining room, with the sunlight lying in broad bars under the apple trees, was strangely beautiful" (Oct 3, 1895). Rose had a garden there with lilac hedges, and she kept a cow and chickens. Although the students were generally helpful to Rose, Mrs. Perkins wrote of one occasion when two of them walked around in Rose's absence and awakened her baby. She also reported that someone, perhaps more amusingly, held phonograph concerts on The Orchard's piazza in 1900.
After the death of Professor Perkins, the Hales moved in with Mrs. Perkins. A few unmarried instructors, among others, occupied their former home for a while, but the building was razed at an unknown date sometime in the twentieth century.
Mrs. Perkins lovingly cared for her garden on the south side of the Chapel/Geological Hall from 1866 to 1920, almost the entire time she was at Union. Beginning as a vegetable garden, it was soon taken over by flowers. Although it now takes up just a small section next to Old Chapel, it once stretched further west behind Hale House and often attracted passers-by and campus visitors. “The Trumpet vine is stunning, far up the corner it holds forth great clusters of its burning trumpets, and is a sight which arrests everybody” (July 31, 1900).
Mrs. Perkins often wrote about her struggles and progress in the garden. Sadly, droughts frequently destroyed many of her plants, yet she still managed to grow tulips, lilies of the valley, irises, dahlias, and clematis, among dozens of others. She also wrote of her cherry tree, pear tree, and creeper plants, as well as the installation of cut stone paths in 1895 and her enjoyment of the birds and butterflies that flew about her plantings. “Everything looks lovely in the garden; …my soul revels in the beauty of it all. I am fairly tipsy with joy” (July 29, 1904). The incursion of others on her garden was not always a source of happiness, however. She was greatly displeased when an electric pole that was needed to provide lighting in the chapel was placed in an unsightly position just outside the garden in January of 1895. But by 1900, she had covered even that eyesore with a climbing shrub.
Every October, Mrs. Perkins would pack up her garden until the spring, but the plant room in her house provided flowers in the winter. In 1900, she wrote a poem about her garden called “Paradise … in … Winter…” in The Checkerberry, the family’s Christmas literary endeavor. In 1926, a few years after Mrs. Perkins’s death, one of her daughters erected a gateway and the commemorative plaque which now hangs outside the wall of the remaining garden.
Philosophical Hall was constructed on the end of North Colonnade in 1852, in accordance with Joseph Jacques Ramée's plans for the campus. Constituting what is now part of the Arts Building, Philosophical Hall provided space for the departments of Natural Philosophy (Physics and Chemistry). The top floor was occupied by the Physics Department, which included a large lecture-demonstration room, while the first floor contained the Chemistry Department and an analytical chemistry laboratory.
As a Chemistry professor, Maurice Perkins spent a lot of time in Philosophical Hall, and after her husband's death in 1901, Mrs. Perkins noted that the sight of the laboratory door became very painful for her. She also mentioned it being very cold there one winter. The equipment in the laboratory did sometimes provide a useful measure of temperature control; in 1898, after some of her daughter Rose's chickens died, Mrs. Perkins wrote that "Papa and Louis are now going to try some eggs in the Incubator in the Laboratory."
After the Chemistry Department moved elsewhere in 1918, the Physics Department took over both floors and the hall was renamed the Physics Building. The building was greatly expanded in the 1920s and 1940s, and when the Physics Department finally moved out after 119 years, the building was renovated again and given over to the College's previously scattered arts departments. It now currently houses Visual Arts and Dance.
Home to the Psi Upsilon Society, this building was the first fraternity house to be constructed on the Union College campus. Psi Upsilon was the fourth national fraternity founded at Union, started by a group of sophomores and freshmen in 1833. The society petitioned the trustees for a building site in 1884, originally planning to build at the foot of the Union Street hill. Construction in the final location did not begin until 1890 and lasted until 1892, immediately prior to which the society had meeting rooms on State Street.
Mrs. Perkins often mentioned Psi Upsilon in her letters, relating news of new members and events such as dances and “smokers.” After attending one afternoon tea at the house, Mrs. Perkins wrote, “It is a comfortable homey sort of a house and the piazza is fine” (June 27, 1899). In 1901, Professor Perkins and Jack had dinner with the Psi Upsilons, which Mrs. Perkins thought was an excellent way to establish closer bonds between students and professors. A year later a fire, likely started by an electric wire, broke out at the Psi Upsilon house, and Mrs. Perkins reported the event in great detail. The firemen had trouble putting it out, because the two hydrants by the house were frozen and a hose had to be carried up Union Street. “The Eastern part is pretty well burned up, and the inside of the house ruined I fear. What with water and smoke, everything is black or drenched” (February [?], 1902). The homeless students were taken in by other fraternities, and the belongings they managed to save by throwing them out the windows were temporarily stored in the YMCA building. It is unclear how long it took before repairs were completed, but fraternity activities continued, and Mrs. Perkins wrote in 1904 that a skating rink was ploughed out near the Psi Upsilon house because of the convenient low ground there.
In 1916, extensive renovations were made to the interior, and the house was put to use as quarters for officers during World War I. The original structure was razed in 1937, and a new one, which better matched Joseph Jacques Ramée’s designs for campus buildings, was constructed on the same site. In 2004, the second Psi Upsilon house was renovated and reopened as Beuth House, one of the seven Minerva Houses on campus.
The Schenectady Free Public Library Association purchased this building site from the College, and the facility was constructed between 1901 and 1903 with the support of $15,000 from the General Company and $50,000 from Andrew Carnegie.
Originally the Association had planned to build the library further west, well off campus at the corner of Union and Jay Streets. An eager library user, Mrs. Perkins did not approve of this location because it was farther from the trolley and surrounded by small houses. Although she argued that either upper State Street or the Union College Pasture would be a better spot, she was upset when part of the latter was indeed sold as a site for the library. However, she was consoled by the idea that the College would be a more appropriate setting for the “dignity and beauty of the building” (March 12, 1901) and by the thought that the money Union received for the land might go toward building a badly needed new dormitory.
Mrs. Perkins was unimpressed by the ceremony that marked the beginning of the library’s construction: “There was a great laying of the New Library cornerstone by the Masons, and many wavings and clappings to the four corners of the earth and other capers. I suppose it is because I am ignorant, but they do seem very funny doings” (May 6, 1902). Nonetheless, Mrs. Perkins was a frequent patron of the library once the building was completed.
After the public library moved to a larger building in downtown Schenectady in 1970, the College repurchased the land as well as the structure and used it for offices before converting it into dormitories in 1973. At that time it was named Webster House in honor of former College President Harrison Webster.
Completed in 1861, this house was built for President Eliphalet Nott and his wife Urania. It was designed by Nott’s grandson, Edward Tuckerman Potter (Union College Class of 1853) according to ideas suggested by Joseph Jacques Ramée’s original plans for the campus. Although Nott himself only spent five years there before he died, his wife continued living in the house until sometime shortly before her own death two decades later. Therefore, subsequent presidents had to find other accommodations. The next president to live in this house was its eighth, Harrison Webster (Union College Class of 1868 and Professor of Natural History), who held the president’s office from 1888 to 1894. During the entire period of Mrs. Perkins’ letters, the house was occupied by the ninth president of the College, Andrew Van Vranken Raymond (the last of Union’s four alumni presidents, Union College Class of 1875).
Although Mrs. Perkins admired President Raymond and recognized the challenges of running the financially struggling college, she was sometimes critical of his administrative abilities. “If Dr. Raymond would give the Dean power, and uphold the Faculty, all might go well, but he is away all the time, really knows nothing about the boys, or the details of anything, and yet will not give the power to any one else” (March 30, 1901). His wife was a close friend of Mrs. Perkins, frequently sharing confidential College business with her. Often ill, Mrs. Raymond nevertheless hosted many social events, sometimes insisting that Mrs. Perkins attend.
After the death of his wife in 1907, President Raymond left the College and returned to his ministry. The house, renovated several times in the twentieth century, remains the home of the Union College President to this day.
Early outdoor track and field meets were held in the College Grove on the southeastern portion of the campus. In 1893, a 390-yard track with banked curves replaced a shorter track that had been laid out there some seven years earlier. From 1893 to 1905, during the period of Mrs. Perkins’ letters, Union typically participated in two intercollegiate meets per year – usually doing poorly.
An exception was the performance of Charles Kilpatrick, Union’s best runner, who broke a world record for the half mile while wearing the College’s colors in September of 1895. Controversy surrounded Kilpatrick’s achievements, however, and Mrs. Perkins wrote at length about his time at Union. (Kilpatrick would eventually move on to Princeton, where additional controversies about his running career arose.) At the time Kilpatrick broke the world record, Union was already in trouble with its intercollegiate athletics league, which claimed that the College allowed athletes who were not bona-fide students to participate in competitions. Union itself was banned from competing in intercollegiate sports for three months once it was determined that it had previously allowed Kilpatrick to represent the College before he was eligible to do so. Union in turn banned Kilpatrick and three other runners from competing because of too many failing grades. After unsuccessfully trying to force the faculty committee to change their minds, the student athletic body went on strike and canceled the Union Track and Field program entirely. Mrs. Perkins wrote with some amusement that “the putting an end to athletics was to punish and terrify the faculty, and now they awake to see that the faculty though sorry for the boys, are not horrified, and even suspect that it may be a good thing” (May 11, 1896). The students soon realized the folly of their plan, and athletics resumed, but the Kilpatrick controversies resulted in the passing of new eligibility rules for college athletes nationwide.
The old running track no longer exists, although it would eventually be replaced by upgraded facilities on Alexander and Bailey fields.