This flagship educational institution of the Mississippi Baptist Convention is the oldest operating college in the state. Established as Hampstead Academy in 1826, it went through a brief period under the Presbyterians before the Baptist Convention acquired it in 1850. A consistent architectural classicism reflects the institution’s long uniform leadership, beginning with the Greek Revival Provine Chapel (1858–1860). Post-World War II modernist buildings were classicized in the twenty-first century with porticos and cornices. A notable exception is the A. E. Wood Coliseum (1977, Biggers, Biggers and Associates, with Ray James and Associates), a geodesic dome visible from most vantage points around town and from I-20.
The campus’s formal entrance is on College Street where a broad set of stairs leads up to a large rectangular tree-shaded quadrangle. On its south side is Nelson Hall (1948, James M. Spain), a brick three-story Georgian Revival administration building with a cupola. On the quad’s east, the red brick temple-form Provine Chapel originally was shared with the town of Clinton’s Baptist congregation. On a raised basement, it is accessed via double stairs set behind the full-height stone Corinthian portico. Its square bell tower was removed in 1910. This is Jacob Larmour’s only known Greek Revival building in Mississippi. Farther east, the plain, three-story Jennings dormitory (1907, W. S. Hull), containing a central courtyard, contrasts with the classicism of Alumni Hall (1926, R. H. Hunt). Hunt’s relationship with Mississippi College began around 1910, when he and landscape architect George E. Kessler of St. Louis produced a campus plan for the institution when it was experiencing its first major growth spurt. Only a few of the buildings shown on their plan were built, but its most important feature, the central quadrangle and the monumental staircase, remain as planned. Hunt’s first building, Science Hall (1911) was demolished in 1968. He also designed Ratliff and Lowry dormitories, both 1914, that form the quad’s west side, and probably Chrest-man Hall ( pictured) and Farr-Hall Hospital (both 1926). Hunt designed the First Baptist Church (1922; 100 College Street) for the town’s Baptist congregation when it moved off campus.
Beginning in 1948, the campus expanded across College Street with Aven Fine Arts Building, and to the south with several red brick dormitories. Since the 1990s, new buildings have been characterized by a red brick neotraditional style with porticos, cast-stone detailing, and, at Cockroft-Caldwell Hall, a dome with cupola.