Date of Acquisition: 1967
Date of Construction: 1872
Architect/Designer: Dixon and Davis
Current Function: study lounge
Daugherty Hall, also known as Old First Presbyterian Church, was dedicated in 1872. Architects Dixon and Davis of Baltimore designed this stone building in the Gothic Revival style. The Wilmington Daily Commercial publicized its construction, describing blue granite and brownstone mined from Chestnut Hill, a steeple soaring 100 feet high and twenty-foot interior ceilings. A large, pointed-arch, stained-glass window dominates the north wall facing Main Street. Narrow, pointed-arch windows with pastel, diamond-shaped panes line the east and west walls between exterior stone buttresses. The slate roof has alternating rows of square and scalloped shingles.
In 1927, the church added a large, two-story Sunday School wing to the rear, built of the same materials and in the same style. Despite protests, this wing was removed in 1994 to allow construction of the new Trabant University Center. Earlier, in the 1960s, the steeple on the northeast corner of the sanctuary had been lowered and refitted with a gable roof.
As an institution, the Presbyterian Church played a large part in the development of Newark Academy, the University's predecessor. Francis Alison, founder of the academy, was a Presbyterian minister, as were many later trustees, professors and principals. The church also collected funding for the academy beginning in 1771. The Presbyterian influence also affected Newark College, with an evangelical New School of Presbyterians becoming particularly important in the 1840s and 50s. The church's influence had declined, however, by the time the College reopened in 1872 (after closing in 1859).
The University of Delaware acquired the building in 1967 and renamed it after J. Fenton Daugherty, professor of physics from 1929 to 1945 and dean of men from 1945 to 1951. Several generations of students knew it as "The Abbey," a cafeteria-style dining facility. In 1995, as part of the new student center project, the University restored the sanctuary and reopened it as a "quiet" study lounge adjoining Trabant University Center.
Daugherty Hall has been listed on the National Register of Historic Places since 1982.
