Reformed Theological Seminary
Mercersburg, Franklin County, Pennsylvania
Marker Inscription
Was situated on this campus, 1837-71. Here, Drs. Frederick A. Rauch, John W. Nevin, Philip Schaff, taught and wrote. Their works on theology, philosophy, and church history were influential in the U.S. and Europe.
Erected by Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission
The Story
From 1837 to 1871, this Mercersburg campus was home to the German Reformed Church's theological seminary and to a remarkable trio of thinkers—Frederick A. Rauch, John W. Nevin, and Philip Schaff. Their work on theology, philosophy, and church history, later known as the "Mercersburg Theology," drew attention on both sides of the Atlantic. For a time this small town was a center of serious religious scholarship.
Why it matters
The Mercersburg theologians shaped American religious thought and church history well beyond their quiet Pennsylvania campus.
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Related people
- · Frederick A. Rauch
- · John W. Nevin
- · Philip Schaff
Themes & tags
Nearby & related markers
Marshall College
Mercersburg, PA · est. 1953
Chartered in 1836 and housed in the local theological seminary building, Marshall College brought serious scholarship to the small town of Mercersburg. Its first president, Frederick A. Rauch, was a German-trained scholar whose textbook on psychology introduced European philosophical ideas to American students. In 1853 the college moved to Lancaster and merged with Franklin College—the origin of today's Franklin & Marshall.
Brown's Mill School
Antrim Township, PA · est. 1966
Built in 1836, this one-room schoolhouse taught generations of rural Franklin County children the basics of reading, writing, and arithmetic. A single teacher would have managed pupils of every age in one room, heated by a stove, until the building finally closed in 1921. Its long life spans nearly a century of American common schooling before consolidation swept such schools away.
Wilson College
Chambersburg, PA · est. 1952
Founded in 1869 and named for its benefactor Sarah Wilson, Wilson College opened its doors to women in 1870, making it one of the oldest women's colleges in the United States. Its first home was "Norland," the former residence of Colonel Alexander K. McClure, a prominent Pennsylvania newspaperman and politician who was a close friend and ally of Abraham Lincoln. The college took root in the optimistic decades after the Civil War, when higher education for women was still a novel and contested idea.
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Built by John Bourns sometime between 1770 and 1780, this modest one-and-a-half story log structure served the young community as both schoolhouse and church — the twin pillars of frontier civic life. In an age when a single sturdy building often had to do double duty, learning and worship shared the same walls. It later became a private dwelling and endures as one of the oldest buildings in Waynesboro.