University of Pennsylvania

The campus of the University of Pennsylvania is another of the jewels of the city. When Benjamin Franklin wrote in 1749 of his plan for a modern education, he sagely noted of his students’ studies that “Art is long, and their time is short,” leading him to propose that their goal be to “learn those Things that are likely to be most useful and most ornamental.” Any tour of the campus should begin with two of the outdoor rooms of the campus, Blanche Levy Park ( PH147.1), the front lawn of College Hall ( PH147.2) where John J. Boyle's 1889 statue of Franklin keeps watch, and the Wynn Commons of the Perelman Quadrangle ( PH147.5) between College Hall and Houston Hall ( PH147.6). Together these spaces form the central campus and contain the first buildings of Provost Charles Stillé's renewed university when it moved to its new campus and new buildings before the nation's centennial.