Dr. Stephen Olin, president-elect, gave up his place at Franklin College, Georgia, December, 1833, and made his preparations to take the presidency at Randolph-Macon. Of this move he wrote Bishop I. O. Andrew:
"Upon the whole, I trust the hand of God is in these indications, and that our church will see and obey it. My vocation may have given a wrong bias to my views, but I must regard the subject of education as the highest after the living ministry; nor do I believe it possible for our church to maintain its ground, to say nothing of its fulfilling its high obligation to Christ and the world, without a great and immediate reformation. I was never so convinced that we must educate our own youth in our own schools, and there is no work to which I so desire to consecrate myself." On his way to Virginia he visited the South Carolina Conference at Charleston. Here he ably advocated the College and secured a pledge from the Conference to endow a professorship, the first we hear of endowment. The whole journey was made in his private carriage, his wife accompanying him. To her he dictated his "Inaugural Address," which she wrote out. Reaching the College after a long and tedious journey, he delivered the address in the College chapel. This address produced a profound impression on those who heard and on those who read it. It was published in the journals of the day, and was highly praised. Governor Tazewell said he had "never heard or read any similar address of equal ability so well suited to such an occasion." It is well worthy of republication in this history, but space will not permit. To show its chief point, the following extracts are given:
"In proportion as virtue is more valuable than knowledge, pure and enlightened morality will be regarded by every considerate father the highest recommendation of a literary institution. The youth is withdrawn from the salutary restraints of parental influence and authority and committed to other guardians at a time of life most decisive of his prospects and destinies. The period devoted to education usually impresses its own character upon all his future history. Vigilant supervision, employment and seclusion from all facilities and temptations to vice are the ordinary and essential securities which every institution of learning is bound to provide for the sacred interests which are committed to its charge. But safeguards and negative provisions are not sufficient. The tendencies of our nature are retrograde, and they call for the interposition of positive remedial influences. The most perfect human society speedily degenerates if the active agencies which were employed in its elevation are once withdrawn or suspended. What, then, can be expected of inexperienced youth sent forth from the atmosphere of domestic piety and left to the single support of its own untested and unsettled principles in the midst of circumstances which often prove fatal to the most practiced virtue! I frankly confess that I see no safety but in the preaching of the cross and in a clear and unfaltering exhibition of the doctrines and sanctions of Christianity…. Christianity is our birthright. It is the richest inheritance bequeathed us by our noble fathers. Are the guardians of public education alone 'halting between two opinions'? Do they think that, in fact and for practical purposes, the truth of Christianity is still a debatable question? Is it still a question whether the generations yet to rise up and occupy the wide domain of this great empire, to be representatives of our name, our freedom, and our glory before the nations of the earth, shall be a Christian or infidel people? Can wise and practical men, who are engaged in rearing up a temple of learning to form the character and destinies of their posterity, for a moment hesitate to make 'Jesus Christ the chief corner-stone'?"
When President Olin took charge of the College he found the system of departments somewhat elective. This was changed on his recommendation, to a curriculum of four classes, by the unanimous vote of the Faculty.
At the annual meeting of the Board, June, 1834, an additional college building was ordered to be built, a four story brick one, to contain thirty-two dormitories, adjacent to the main building. This was to supply rooms for the increased number of students.
The salaries of full professors was fixed at $1,000. The following resolution was adopted:
"That whereas the South Carolina and Georgia Conferences have manifested a deep interest in the permanent establishment of Randolph-Macon College by each agreeing to raise a sum sufficient to endow a professorship, and in consideration of which professorships they ask the privilege of sending, perpetually, the former Conference five and the latter seven students, to be educated free of tuition fees; and whereas we highly appreciate the generous spirit of said Conferences, therefore we hereby agree to receive ten from each of these Conferences free of tuition fees."
As further evidence of the interest felt by these Conferences, it was noted that Rev. W. M. Wightman, of South Carolina, and Dr. Lovick Pierce and Mr. E. Sinclair, of Georgia, attended the meeting of the Board at this session.
At the annual meeting held June, 1835, Professor E. D. Sims was granted leave to visit Europe to prosecute the study of Modern Languages, and particularly Anglo-Saxon and Gothic, preparatory to the more thorough teaching of the English language. This, so far as we know, was the first move made by any college in America, and marks an epoch in that department. Prof. J. B. Henneman, in the Sewanee Review, in a sketch of the teaching of English, in American colleges, gives the credit of inaugurating the English course to Randolph-Macon College.
A distinct and special effort was made at this meeting of the Board to endow a professorship, and the President of the Board made a subscription towards it of two hundred dollars. This was to be called the Virginia Conference Scholarship.