Abner Jackson Papers

Born in Washington, Pennsylvania, in 1811, Abner Jackson graduated from Trinity College (Hartford, CT) in 1837, when he was appointed Tutor and Librarian of the college. In 1838, he became Adjunct Professor of Ancient Languages at Trinity.

In 1840, he took the dual post of Professor of Intellectual Philosophy and Lecturer in Chemistry and Mineralogy. He became a member of St. John's Church in Hartford, CT, after its creation in March 1841. At that time, he briefly became president of the Ecclesiological Society, a group of High Church alumni interested in the science of liturgics. Perhaps as a result of these theological yearnings, Jackson taught theological courses at Trinity College as well as teaching popular courses about philosophy, chemistry, and mineralogy. While living on campus, Jackson cultivated a garden of varied flowers and vegetables. In April 1840, he married Emily Ellsworth, grand-daughter of U.S. Supreme Court Justice Oliver Ellsworth.

In 1858, he moved to Geneva, New York, to become the President of Hobart College. During the Civil War, he helped with the raising of St. John's Chapel at Hobart, where he remained until 1867. In that year, Jackson returned to Trinity College (Hartford, CT) to assume the role of President. Before arriving on campus in October 1867, Jackson sojourned in Europe.

During his time as President of Trinity College, which lasted from 1867 until his death in 1874, Jackson publicly contradicted a controversy that erupted over the number of Trinity students who were supporters of the Democratic Party. Jackson argued that even though the percentage of Democratic students had risen from the minority that might have been on campus during the Civil War, it was no where near the five-sixths figure that had been reported in the Hartford Courant, the major Republican newspaper.

When in March 1872 the Trinity College Board of Trustees approved, by a 12 to 4 vote, to accept the City of Hartford's offer to purchase the campus for $600,000, President Jackson was initially opposed. Yet, he finally came to approve the opportunity to expand the campus from its three buildings and construct new facilities. At the request of the Trustees, Jackson toured England and Scotland in 1872 in order to hire an architect to draw up a plan for the new campus. It was Jackson who found and engaged the services of William Burges, an architect with a London office. By the following year, Burges had designed what historian Glenn Weaver calls "the most elaborate plan which had ever been designed for an American college campus."

Unexpectedly, Abner Jackson died from pneumonia on April 19, 1874, as the ground for the current Trinity College campus was about to be broken.