Hopper College & Old Yale Divinity School

Yale Divinity School originated in 1822 as the Yale Theological Department — making it one of the earliest formally organized theological faculties in the United States. For more than a century it occupied space on central campus, notably the “Divinity College” row of brick buildings on Elm Street near the Old Campus, on the site of what is presently Hopper College. In the 1920s, the School moved to Prospect Hill where architect Delano & Aldrich designed a coherent Georgian-Revival collegiate compound (completed 1932) expressly to give theology at Yale its own distinct academic precinct. Over the 20th century the School became a major ecumenical hub — spawning the Div School Library (and later the Day Missions Collection), the Institute of Sacred Music (shared with the School of Music), and a global network of ministerial and scholarly alumni. It remains the most intact pre-WWII collection of Georgian-Revival collegiate architecture at Yale.